


Star Cross

by Juniper_Night



Category: Steven Universe (Cartoon), Teen Titans (Animated Series)
Genre: ;), Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Crossover, F/F, Gen, Homeworld is Horrible, Humans Are Weird, Now With Pictures!, Slow Burn, Star Sapphire - Freeform, allies to friends to lovers, earth is strange
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-02-24
Updated: 2019-10-14
Packaged: 2019-11-04 19:13:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 10
Words: 21,166
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17903921
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Juniper_Night/pseuds/Juniper_Night
Summary: Star Sapphire collapsed to her knees. She’d been so close. She’d finally escaped Homeworld, only to be caught by a different kind of monster; out of the lab, and into the prison cell. Probably these strange organic beings, the “Gordanians”, intended to enslave her. Or maybe – and this thought sent a chill to the very core of her gem – maybe they wanted to trade her back to Homeworld.She needed to get out.(Ignore what the label says; this isn't a crossover - it's a fusion.)





	1. Gem Go

“Ugh-hARGGGG!!!” She screamed as she slammed the device restraining her hands into the door. The sound of ringing metal reverberated through the small cell, driving her back a few steps before she charged forward with a roar and slammed the metal again. And again. And _again_. She gave a sort of hopeless cry as she collapsed to her knees. She’d been _so close_. She’d finally escaped Homeworld, only to be caught by a different kind of monster; out of the lab, and into the prison cell. Probably these strange organic beings, the “ _Gordanians_ ”, intended to enslave her. Perhaps they intended to experiment on her themselves. Or maybe – and this thought sent a chill to the very core of her gem – maybe they wanted to use her as a bargaining chip with Homeworld. There was no way she was going back, not now, not when they would surely sha-

She needed to get out.

She forced herself to her feet and glared out the narrow window at the small gathering of guards that had amassed outside her door. They held up their spears and spoke in their strange, hissing language. She roared back, outraged at their audacity, and strengthened by her own righteous fury.

 She would – SLAM! – get – SLAM! – out! – **CRASH!!**

The door buckled and flew out of the frame. The closest guard seemed to shrink back, but not far enough back to dodge a blow that sent them barreling into the far wall. The next two guards met similar fates, but the last managed to block her with their spear once, twice, before they too were sent flying – right into an alarm trigger. She cursed.

She could hear the approach of dozens if not scores of Gordanian soldiers running toward her location as the emergency lights flashed distractedly on and off, but she forced herself to stop and focus. The stale, pressure-controlled atmosphere of the ship was cold against her projected form, but she could feel the heat and light energy trapped inside her core. She let the energy rise to the surface of her gem, twinkling like starlight as it built up pressure-

With a blast of heat and light, the outer walls of the space vehicle gave way before her.

Freedom.

 

 ****)o(****

 

She’d always been good at levitation, even for her gem type. Every ounce of that ability was put to use as she tried to resist the gravitational pull of the planet she’d chosen to land on, hoping to avoid a crash landing. Her resistance was futile. She was used to that. Still, she thought, as she picked herself up from the bottom of a smoking crater; she could have done worse. She could have made an even bigger crater. She could have cracked her gem, but – she checked – it was still very much whole.

Shaking some of the rubble rock off herself, she climbed to the rim of the crater. The smoke was thinner there, and after a moment she detected gem-like forms approaching. Ah. So this was an inhabited planet. That was unfortunate, as her limited experience with those had been unhappy thus far. This planet was not, however, a gem-controlled planet; that much became clear as the forms solidified into fleshy, organic creatures, no bigger than pearls. There was no risk of being immediately warped back to the Diamond Authority, a definite plus in her logs. Perhaps these organic beings could be negotiated with.

“Release me from these shackles, and I will give you no harm!” She shouted in Tam’eranian. “Release me from these!”

None of the beings made any intelligent sounds in reply. Most of them shuffled backwards in fright, but one raised a small device which flashed at her, temporarily blinding her.

“ARRUGGH!”

That flash triggered too many bad memories. She needed to get these restraints off. She could not afford to be weak!

She raised her arms and smashed the nearest object, an oddly shaped pod that she could only assume was for terrestrial transport. She smashed a few more of these pods, and the paved path they rested on, all to no avail.

“Ughh…” She groaned in frustration. There had to be something strong enough on this primitive planet to break her free!  There was a structure near her. A large portion of the second level of said structure was being supported by a single beam. Surely that would be strong enough?

With a cry she leapt towards the pillar and began whaling on it.

“You.” _CLANK!_

“Must.” _CLANK!_

“COME OFF!” _CLANK!_

She might have kept at it until either the pillar or her restraints broke, but out of nowhere something struck the metal visor she wore around her head and sent her stumbling sideways.

Pushing herself back to her feet, she looked up to see another of the gem-like-but-not organic beings. They were different from the ones she’d seen so far. For one thing, they weren’t afraid of her. For another, they were uncomfortably colorful. The only other thing she’d ever seen with that many colors smashed together was an experimental gem cluster.

The Colorful One shouted something at her. There were definitely words in there, meaning these beings weren’t so backwards that they lacked language, but it was still unintelligible babble to her.

Their stance, however, she could understand, and it was not friendly. Manacles or no, there was no way she was coming off as weak. She made the first move and charged, but she hit only the pavement where the Colorful One had been standing moments before. It was fast, this being; she would give them that. Each strike she made was met only with the thick atmosphere of this strange planet. The Colorful One dodged one last lunge from her before they threw a small device at her that exploded upon contact with the ground. So they were throwing things at her now? At a being whose hands were obviously bound? What a cheap tactic. If that’s how they wanted to fight, though, then that’s how she’d fight back.

Slipping a toe under one of the terrestrial transport vehicles, she hefted it into the air with one foot before sending it towards the Colorful One with a hard kick.

It missed. She’d been close, though.

The Colorful One seemed surprised at her strength. They had yet to try and strike her physically, so perhaps that was an indicator that the beings on this planet were weak. That was good; it increased her odds of survival once she finished breaking off these restraints. The Colorful One had actually paused to watch the vehicle as it crashed into a building some _metroj_ away and exploded. She used their distraction to finally land a blow.

They went skidding along the pavement, but they were not so weak that they couldn’t manage to dodge her next strike, and then they sent _her_ flying into a vehicle with the aid of a metal staff.

The staff broke though. Ha.

“Talc,” she taunted as she picked herself up. She lunged into the air once more, up and ready to strike –

And then something rammed into her from the side, and she found herself sprawled on the ground. What? She levitated herself to her feet and observed that a new being had joined the Colorful One. She could have sworn that she’d seen something green and with horns, but this one was also gem-like in their physique. They looked more normal than the Colorful One, in her opinion; they were purple and black, just two colors. They weren’t very intelligent, though, keeping their back to her like that, even if they did appear to be reporting to their superior. She winced suddenly in sympathy. If they had gotten to attacking her only after their superior, then things would not go well for them.

Maybe she should end this quickly for their sake. With a bit of effort, she managed to position her arms beneath a larger terrestrial vehicle, one that was the size of at least ten of the one she’d thrown earlier.  She launched it towards the two, only for a third being to appear! What was with this planet and tardy reinforcements? This being was strong, too. Strong enough to catch the large vehicle.

The Colorful One, the Shape Changer, and the Strong One had all grouped together, and appeared to be exchanging words. Were they creating a strategy they could use against her? Either way, three against one were not favorable odds.

She banged her arms once more against the pavement, and the dented outer hull of the restraints finally – finally! – crumpled and fell off.

She felt much lighter now. More importantly, her hands were now free even if her arms were still bound together. With a low growl she lifted her arms until they were perpendicular to her body. The familiar energy rose to the surface, causing the star on the gem at her throat to glow brighter than usual. An intense heat ran in a current from her core to her fists, where the energy became visible; she began to fire. The three organic beings were barely able to dodge as she released a volley of solar bolts, each bolt containing the energy of a small solar flare.

She’d heard of other gems doing something similar, of channeling blasts of raw energy through their weapons in combat, but nothing like this. Nothing this potent, and certainly nothing of this magnitude.

Even she could not keep it up forever, though. The three organic beings had vanished – taking shelter behind a pile of rubble, perhaps, or maybe seeking reinforcements – so she allowed herself to stop firing and sink to her knees.

Dully, she noted that three figures were running towards her, but they were still so far away that she couldn’t convince herself to rise just yet. She bowed her head to examine her gem, making sure it wasn’t damaged. Because of that, she never saw the shield that sprang up between her and the three figures, a shield that was larger than any she’d ever seen or heard of a gem producing. She didn’t see the new figure that had suggested she might not be an enemy, or the brief negotiations that followed, but she did see the Colorful One approach her. She instantly rose to her feet, summoning the energy back to her hands. The Colorful One didn’t raise any weapon, though. They didn’t even crouch to attack. She held the glowing energy anyway.

“Retreat!” The Colorful One put a hand to their belt. “Retreat and leave me alone!” She shouted again, but when the Colorful One held up their hands, all they held was what appeared to be a tool, not a weapon.

She had absolutely no idea what it said in response – which was getting kind of annoying – but she decided to take a chance and power down. If the tiny object turned out to be a weapon of some kind, she would flip the creature into the nearest building.

The risk payed off. In a moment she was finally free, and the Colorful One started to say something again, but of course she couldn’t understand a word the clod was saying to her, so she grabbed them and forced their mouth against her own.

Aside from the Gordanians, she’d never met someone who didn’t speak the same language as her before.  Maybe it was in all sapphires’ programming, maybe it was the result of some experiment, but somehow she knew that establishing lip to lip contact would transmit their language into her.

She shoved the Colorful One away from her the moment she felt the transfer was complete.

Now when she spoke, it was in the ‘English,’ a language native to this planet:

“If you wish not to be destroyed, you will leave me alone!”

 She didn’t wait for a reply. Instead she pushed off the ground hard and levitated away.

From the air she could see the city stretching out beneath her for _mejloj_ – or miles, her new language supplied helpfully - beneath her. On one end, the city faded away into hills and then mountains covered in strange green organisms the people of this planet called ‘plants.’ The other end of the city ended abruptly at a large body of water called a ‘bay,’ or perhaps an ocean or a sea; her new language had many words for water bodies, and she was unsure which to use. Just above the mountains and heading in her general direction was…. a large metal spaceship.  A very large, very pointy, and very familiar spaceship.

X’hal! She dove back down into the metal cliffs and canyons of the city, choosing paths at random. When she’d seen this planet from above, it had seemed huge! How had they tracked her down so quickly? She waited in a dark crevice – an alley – between two buildings as the dark underside of the ship passed over her, then she quickly flew in the other direction. She didn’t see the giant holographic message, but she certainly heard it:

_“People of Earth” –_ Ah, so that was this planet’s name–“ _we come to your planet hunting an escaped prisoner, a very dangerous prisoner. Do not interfere, and we will leave your city with only minimal damage. But if you attempt to assist her, your destruction will be **absolute**.”_

The gem laughed. This Lord Troggar, leader of the Gordanians, was a fool if they thought that anyone would try to assist her, not when she had literally nothing to her name but herself. She flew into the nearest empty building and prepared to wait.

 

****)o(****

 

The building that she had entered was a strange one. It was dimly lit, and full of obstacles. Two of the walls were made of glass, so she quickly made her way through the rows of shelves and deeper into what her new language was calling a “store.” At the very back was a table of sorts, with small machines on top and a glass casing on the bottom. She paused to examine one of the many colorful rectangular prisms that lined the shelves. It was covered in a graphic depiction of a four-legged organic creature with a mechanical propeller in its back. To her surprise, when she picked it up, another rectangular prism slid out, this one plain and black. She examined the device curiously, trying to peer within the two white circles embedded in it.

“Uh, those are more fun to watch when you use a VCR.”

It was the Shape Changer. She rounded on them, dropping the device and summoning the energy to her hands with a growl.

“It’s alright. We’re friends, remember?” the Colorful One stated.

“Friends?” She repeated. The word was foreign to her, and not just because of the language. “Why? For what purpose did you free me?” She demanded of them.

“Just… trying to be nice,” the Colorful One said.

“Nice.” She repeated again. “We do not have this word on my planet. Closest is _rutha_ , weak!”

The Strong One seemed to be offended by that, but perhaps they expressed their fear as anger, the way she had known several gems to do in the labs. “Well, around here nice means nice, and if you want us to _keep_ being nice you’ll tell us why the lizard king took you prisoner.”  It took her a moment to decode that sentence – what were lizards? _What was nice?_ – but when she did, she drew her power back in to her core.

“I do not know...” she said cautiously. “I think the Gordanians will take me back to their Citadel, to live out my days as their servant.” If she was lucky. She didn’t want to think about the alternatives.

“And the Gordanians are?”

“Not… _nice_.”

“Then you’re not going with them. Not if I have anything to say about it.”

Her eyes widened. Was the Colorful One proposing an alliance?

“Um, don’t you mean we?” The Shape Changer said right before the wall exploded.

All five of them were knocked backwards, but all five just as quickly got back on their feet. They shared a glance before rushing to meet the enemy. There were dozens of Gordanians, much more than the four she’d fought aboard the ship, but somehow fighting them was much easier now that she had allies.

With a flying kick, she sent one Gordanian crashing into another. She fired star bolts at one, brought her fists down on another, and looked for more to fight, only to see that her abductors were making a quick, airborne retreat. She contemplated their fleeing forms. Maybe it would be… _nice_ , having _friend_ s.

 Aloud, she said, “I believe your expression is ‘thanks.’”

“Aw, man – my suit!” She turned in curiosity at the cry, and was surprised to see that the Strong One was no longer the dull gray of stone. Instead, she saw the smooth, shiny planes of metal. Ragged strips of grey covering hung disconcertingly over shiny silver armor and glowing blue panels. The Strong One was not a gem, but they didn’t look entirely organic either. That was confusing to her, but the Shape Changer merely seemed excited.

“So? You look way cooler without it.”

“Yeah, like I’m taking fashion advice from the guy in the goofy mask,” the Strong One said.

“Goofy? My mask is cool… isn’t it? Raven?”

She watched the exchange, trying to keep up with all the strange words and gestures of a culture that was very different from any she’d seen in the labs of Homeworld. She was also trying to figure out when the fourth being, a quiet figure draped in blue who reminded her disconcertingly of Blue Diamond, had joined the other people of Earth.

“But what about my secret identity?”

“What secret identity? You’re green.”

She had seen plenty of green gems on Homeworld, was that uncommon on Earth? Come to think of it, had she seen any orange beings on this planet? She might have difficulty blending in here, assuming she survived Lord Troggar’s next attack.

The Colorful One was thinking on the same wavelength. “This isn’t over. Now that we’ve interfered –”

“–Troggar will strike harder. It is only a matter of–”

_“Fools! The earth scum were warned. Your insolence will be punished. Your city shall be **destroyed**.”_ She glared up at the ship she could just make out in the distance. She was no stranger to cruelty, but that didn’t mean she had to approve of Lord Troggar’s. How many were going to die now, because of her?

 “Great,” the Hooded One drawled, even though this was _clearly_ a horrible situation.

“So after trashing a pizza place and a perfectly good video store, now we’ve managed to make a humongous space gecko mad enough to vaporize our entire town?” the Shape Changer asked redundantly.

“Go team.”

Team? _Team?!_

“All the fault is yours! I commanded you leave me alone, but you insisted upon the being ‘nice!’”

“My fault?! You blast me, you kiss me, but you never stop to mention they have a gigantic particle weapon?!”

 “It is obvious that they have the weapons! They warned you not to assist me, I told you not to assist me, but you did it anyway and endangered this “city” like a _Clorbag_ _barbernelk_!”

“QUIET!” yelled the Hooded One. The gem blinked. She had not expected them to be capable of such volume, but their next words were soft once more, “Hi.” The Hooded one seemed reluctant to say anything more, but the Colorful One picked up for them.

“Look, it doesn’t matter how we got into this mess. We’re in it, and we will get out of it… _together.”_

The other three organic beings made a small head motion in response to the Colorful One’s words, and while she didn’t recognize the gesture, she could read the determination on their faces. Star Sapphire pursed her lips.

“C’mon – we’ve got a city to save.”

“What do you propose?” she asked grudgingly.

“Before we can do anything we need to get on that ship,” the Colorful One said. From where they stood, they could see where the ship was hovering above the ocean, far from any structures. “I don’t suppose anyone else can fly?”

“Ooh, me! I can!” said the Shape Changer. They shifted their form into that of a small, green creature with wings instead of arms to demonstrate.

“As can I,” she stated, though by now that was obvious. “I am also capable of carrying someone.”

The Hooded One was still gazing contemplatively at the ship. “I can fly,” they said, “but if I knew where to go, I could teleport us there.”

“Dude, sweet!”

The Hooded One looked at her expectantly, and after a moment of thought she said, “When they first brought me aboard the ship, we passed through a room for storing… non-sentient cargo. I saw no soldiers there, and it would be a discreet place to teleport.”

“Where?”

“At the bottom of the ship, near the back.”

The Colorful One filled out the rest of the plan. “The control room for the ship will have to be at the front of the ship. That’s probably where we’ll find Troggar and his weapon. When we get there, focus on _disabling the weapon_.” The Colorful One looked at her as they said that, as though they were trying to emphasize that this mission was about saving the city more than it was about enacting revenge. She huffed and imitated the nodding gesture the others had done.

“Everybody ready?”

 

****)o(****

 

Aside from a drop in temperature – something organic beings were apparently sensitive to – the Hooded One’s teleportation of their group to a discreet location occurred without issue, and they quickly identified a likely passage and began walking. The halls were utilitarian and uninteresting, and the sound of their footsteps, subdued. It gave her time to think.

The gem couldn’t help feeling a little bad. She was sort of-kind of beginning to understand this concept of “nice,” and the fact that these four organic beings had helped her despite several warnings, which before had struck her as foolish, now seemed very, very nice. Certainly it was not the sort of action that deserved to be met with harsh words.

“I bring you... a-polo-gy,” she said to The Colorful One, making sure to pronounce the strange word correctly.

“Don’t worry about it. I’m sorry I yelled too.”

“And again you are… nice. On my world I never knew such kindness.”

“Well, things are different here.”

The Colorful One smiled at her, and she thought she might be smiling back, when the Shape Changer interrupted.

“Uh, guys? I think they know we’re here.”

The gem started at the sight of the Gordanian guards who had managed to sneak up on them, but smirked when she realized there were only three. The Colorful One ducked and weaved beneath the attacks of the nearest Gordanian and swept them off their feet with a low kick. She unleashed a barrage of star bolts on the second as the Shape Changer and the Strong One charged the third. She had disarmed her opponent and had them on the verge of collapse when a dark energy wrapped around their torso and lifted all three “space geckos” off the ground.

The Colorful One shot a smile towards the Hooded One. “Nice one,” they said. 

 

****)o(****

 

It was not hard to find the control center. Lord Troggar had a loud voice.

“The Earth scum shall learn. It takes more than five juvenile heroes to defy the mighty Lord Troggar!”

Lord Troggar also had a nasty habit of speaking in the third person.

They could have attempted to hack the door, but blasting it was faster and _much_ more satisfying.

**_CRASH!!_** The metal skidded across the floor.

“We’re not five heroes. We’re one team,” the Colorful One declared

The Gordanians charged forward, but their rag tag group had the element of surprise, and the five of them managed to land a few good strikes before they took a single hit of their own… but these weren’t the rookie foot soldiers they’d been fighting before. When these Gordanians started landing hits, they hit hard. This battle wasn’t going as well as the previous ones.

One of the Gordanian soldiers focused on her, and it was all she could do to punch and block and dodge and swing, unable to pull back enough to find her center. It was sheer luck that they tripped over the metal door they’d blasted down earlier. With a blast of energy delivered at close range, her enemy stayed down. She looked up from the lizard’s slumped form just in time to see the Colorful One hit the wall.

“Hey!” She shouted.

The Gordanian standing over her friend looked up in time to take a star bolt to the face.

Later, she would reflect that she had never used her star bolts for someone else’s sake before. Earlier, she had been using them to help herself escape. On Homeworld, she had used them because the scientists wanted her too, and because defiance would not end well for her; replacing her would take time of course, but she was replaceable. But this – using star bolts to protect her friends – felt different. There was a sort of righteous fury that empowered her, pushing her to release more bolts, giving her strength she’d never had before.

At the time, she just noticed that her star bolts seemed to be working. She let the energy surge up and sent out a fiery army of her own, knocking back soldiers in every direction, steering clear of where her friends still fought. The Gordanians stumbled, their uniforms aflame and sending thick plumes of smoke into the air.

She paused where she hovered, no longer able to distinguish her friends from her enemies. The haze shrouded a soldier from her sight until they were nearly upon her, and by then it was too late to do more than lift her foot before she was pinned to the ground. She drew back and kicked, and they reeled back, but didn’t fall.  Another figure appeared as she twisted onto her elbows, and she launched herself in the opposite direction, half-crawling, half-levitating. But when she turned around, it was the Strong One she saw, sinking their fist into the joint between the space-gecko’s head and neck. She spun on her heels and the next blow the Strong One delivered to the soldier was concurrent with her own.

Together, she dared to hope that they would be victorious. Then their combatant rammed them back. They were both sent skidding to the other side of the control room, where they arrived in a graceless pile next to the Colorful One. The gem winced and rubbed her head.

“Can you rewire that into some sort of weapon?” she heard the Colorful One ask. Once her perception stopped spinning, she was able to see that the two earthlings were regarding the Strong One’s arm, where some of the metal components had shifted.

“I can try.”

_In the middle of battle?_ She thought incredulously. She doubted a peridot could do it. She left them to their tinkering and pulled herself up. They were surrounded and losing. Lord Troggar may have been arrogant, but they were also strong, and their army was numerous.

She summoned her energy to her fists, wondering if shattering in a fight was preferable to shattering in captivity.

“Get _away_ from my friends!”

The gem barely had time to be surprised at the Hooded One’s second outburst before-

“ _Azarath, Metrion, ZINTHOS!”_

It was hard to process what happened in that split second. Something loud seemed to have burst forth from the quietest of her allies, something dark and cold that contained and exploded simultaneously, leaving fire in its wake. When it disappeared, their enemies were left like so much rubble rock on the floor.

The largest lump on the floor twitched. It slowly rose and straightened until Lord Troggar stood at full height, towering over the Hooded One and the Shape Changer, who by now were leaning on each other to stay upright. Then there was one final blast, and her captor returned to the floor. The gem turned. To her shock, the Strong One had converted their arm into a miniature laser light cannon.

The Strong One grinned. “Alright, I’m only gonna say this once: Booyah.”

 

****)o(****

 

After the stale smoke of the space ship, the salty breeze of this planet’s “ocean” felt good. She was all too happy to follow the Hooded One’s lead and levitate off the downed craft and onto a nearby outcrop of rocks, taking the Colorful One with her.

“You know… we just kicked butt, and I don’t even know your guyses names,” said the Shape Changer, landing easily on a boulder after shifting back to a gem-like form. “I’m Beast Boy.”

“Cyborg.”

“Raven.”

“Robin.”

The gem blinked. Like ‘nice’ and ‘apology,’ ‘name’ did not appear to have a direct translation into Tam’eranian.  She gathered that it was a word used to describe or denote something, and did her best to answer from there.

“I am an orange corundum with an artificially enhanced asterism.”

Silence.

“Sooo, a Star Sapphire?” Cyborg finally supplied.

“Yes, that would be correct.”

“More like Star-Fire,” Beast Boy joked.

Star Sapphire giggled. “That would also be an accurate description.”

“Welcome to Earth, Star Sapphire.”

“I thank you all for your bravery and help, and… I wish to ask permission to remain here, where the people are most strange, but also most- _kind_.”

“You don’t need our permission,” The Hooded One – Raven – said.

Robin interjected, “But if you want our friendship, you’ve got it.”

“’Think we could all use some new friends,” Cyborg observed, and Beast Boy nodded their agreement.

“Besides we kinda made a good team!”

 

****)o(****

 

Eventually her new friends left the island. They flew back to the mainland to do whatever it was that “human beings” did, but Star Sapphire elected to stay. It was peaceful on the island, surrounded by sunlight and waves. She’d discovered other organic creatures among the rocks, though they were small and non-sentient. She wasn’t sure what to call them, but they were soft beneath her fingers, and she collapsed onto them.

A heavy weariness had settled over her; it had been a long time since she had spent this long outside of her gem. She stretched out on a boulder facing the sun and basked in the heat for a long time before she released her form and retreated into her gem stone.

For most of her short existence, she’d worn armor – not that it’d done much against the destabilizers of Homeworld. But Earth was very different from Homeworld, and her new friends were _very_ different from the gems she’d known. Perhaps she could be different too. She snuggled in cozily and thought for the first time about changing her form into something a little more “nice.”

 

**Omake:**

Beast Boy: “Sooo, does that make you a Rock-Star?”

Star Sapphire: *Looks confused* “Yes. Is that not what I said?”

Beast Boy: “… Nevermind.”


	2. Interim

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Star Sapphire and Robin catch up over giant squid monsters.

Earth was beautiful. The shifting sky, the trees with their subtle geometry, the light reflecting off the buildings, the tiny plant-organisms pushing up at the edges of the pavement – all of it was mesmerizing to Star Sapphire. It was true that the architecture lacked the elegance of Homeworld, but there was nonetheless something endearing about it. And the people! They were called “humans,” and much like gems, they were sentient beings who worked in groups to form civilizations - but that was where the similarities seemed to end. Star Sapphire observed them quietly from a “bench,” a long chair which anybody seemed to be allowed to use, regardless of caste. Actually, the only reason she was sure there were castes at all was because she had seen a rare half-sized human chastised for disobeying their master, a taller human who was pushing a small cart with an organic being inside that was too small and wrinkly to be the same species.

The ‘Sun’ – a curious name which the people of this planet had given to the sole star at the center of their solar system – had already moved across the sky from one side of the bench to the other, and Star Sapphire wondered idly if Earth’s rotations were shorter than Tam’eranian ones. She sat and watched and wondered for a long time; she had nothing better to do, after all. Not like the other people on the street, who were almost all busy. They bustled from one place to another by foot and by machine. Some of them worked even as they walked, speaking into small portable communication devices, or maintaining their forms with “food” and “drink.” Star Sapphire felt left out just watching them. They each seemed to have a different function, yet they looked so alike. It was baffling to the gem. Organic beings could not be programmed, so how did humans figure out their purpose if not from appearance?

Suddenly, the humans seemed to abandon those unfathomable purposes. Star Sapphire jumped to her feet as she saw people screaming and running the way they had her first night – had another gem crash landed on earth?

Something rounded the corner – a massive, purple something with a tall narrow body and many scuttling legs. Where their head should have been, there was instead a long joint-less limb with a pair of pincers at the top… pincers that were currently flailing into buildings and throwing the debris at innocent people. Star Sapphire could see no restraints, nor anything attacking them – they had no reason to be doing what they were doing. Her new language supplied the word for the thing: Monster. She sprang from the bench and flew towards it.

“I insist that you stop what you are doing!” She shouted.

The monster made a sound like ‘blurble-gluggle-skreeeeee!’ and swung its pincer at her. Star dodged and flew out of its range, and the monster continued on its destructive rampage. Star Sapphire’s muscles tensed in anger as she realized that it was ignoring her – it didn’t consider her a threat. The quartzes back in the lab hadn’t thought much of her either, but she’d shown them. She hurled the nearest chunk of rubble at the monster and it smashed into the monsters… torso… region. _That_ got its attention.

“I said, stop!”

The creature charged at her. Star Sapphire drew up her star bolts - only to watch the monster trip over a cord that had not been there a moment before. Star Sapphire looked around in confusion – how…?

“Good to see you again,” said Robin politely as they ran up the side of the fallen creature, dodging the pincer as they went and still trailing reinforced paracord. They jumped off the other side and proceeded to wind the line around a streetlight and through the monster’s legs. Star Sapphire shook herself into action and began to circle overhead.

The monster didn’t appear to have any reasoning – or any eyes for that matter. It just thrashed around, swinging its tentacle in every direction and crushing anything that fell into its pincer. Robin dodged it with ease, and Star Sapphire did her best to do the same as she launched star bolt after star bolt.

On one flail, however, the monster got lucky. Her new friend ducked when they should have jumped and was knocked off their feet by the heavy tentacle; Robin barely managed to somersault out of being crushed. Robin bounced to their feet as soon as they left the roll. The unnatural limb swung back around, but Robin threw something small and beeping with diamond-worthy precision. The device detonated on impact.

Star Sapphire flinched and instinctively raised her arms to protect her gem. When she looked again, there was nothing but smoke.

)o(

“Where did it go?”

Robin was baffled. “I don’t know. It should be right here… Unless it teleported? It looked like it just… poofed.”

Robin picked his way through the rubble rock and bits of twisted metal, searching for possible escape routes or some other hint as to what had happened. Star Sapphire drifted above him, examining the ground from a higher vantage point.

Evidently her search was more successful; he heard her give a horrified gasp and she dived down into the wreckage.

“It’s a gem!”

“Wait, what?” Robin vaulted over a downed tree and under two streetlights before he reached Star Sapphire, whose orange skin and new dress looked even more out of place next to a broken phone repair sign.

“It’s a gem, Robin! A gem - like _me._ ” She gestured at the orange sapphire set at the base of her throat, and then pointed at the inky purple stone at her feet.

“ _Oh_.” Robin stared at the mauve gem, not quite able to equate the still stone with the being that had been attacking them just moments prior. It suddenly occurred to him that when the tiny alien girl in front of him had referred to herself as a sapphire, she had meant it literally. Somehow, her existence might actually be tied to a rock. He tried to wrap his head around that. “What happened to… the rest of it?”

“It has dissipated its projected form and retreated into its core.”

Of course, solid projections from an alien race of animated rocks, he should have known… Honestly, why had Bruce bothered to hire physics tutors for him at all when they were contradicted at every turn by allies and enemies alike?

“Can it… come back?” Robin asked. The look Star Sapphire was giving the downed squid-crab-rock-monster-alien- _thing_ was putting him on edge. It seemed to take her a moment to register that she’d been asked a question.

“What? Oh – yes, it will regenerate unless it is prevented from doing so by containment.” So it could come back – that was worrisome, but the fact that he hadn’t accidentally killed something made him feel a lot better.

“A container, huh? I can do that…”

They ended up trapping it in a styrofoam cup they lifted off an overturned food truck. Then, for lack of a better place to take it, the two of them began the several-block journey to the nearest police station (Robin had memorized their locations and several city maps on the bus ride to Jump.)

“So, are there lots of different, uh, species on your planet?” Robin asked as they walked.

Star Sapphire considered the question. “Yes,” she said carefully, “but not the same way Earth has species.

“There are many varieties of gem – sapphires, rubies, quartzes, beryls – in many sizes and colors, but we all have the same basic shape. I have never seen anything like that” - she gestured to the cup in Robin’s hands – “before.”

“Nothing?”

“Well, sometimes when things go terribly wrong, a gem’s form could be affected, but…” Star Sapphire shuddered and didn’t continue.

“… Do you have any idea what could have happened here?”

 Star Sapphire had folded her arms close to her gem, and her gaze was now directed somewhere near her feet. “I- May we speak of something else?”

“Sure-” Robin barely got the word out before Star Sapphire asked her own question -

“What is your purpose?”

“My – what?”

“Your purpose. What is it that you do?”

“I fight crime. I protect innocent people.”

“What do I call you? The kind of human for fighting crime?”

“Most people call us heroes. Super heroes.” Star Sapphire paused to consider the term, and Robin took the opportunity to ask something he’d meant to ask before an alien mutant had started rampaging through midtown. “Actually, if you wanted to, you could be a super hero too. I’m starting a team.”

Star Sapphire gaped up at him, and not for the first time, Robin wished he could see her eyes - which was rich coming from him.

“But - I was not made for fighting.”

“On Earth, no one’s really made to do anything. We choose our own purposes.”

Star Sapphire pursed her lips and didn’t say anything for a long time.

Eventually she said, “I am… unsure.”

“That’s alright, you don’t have to decide right now,” Robin said. “I thought we might want to keep in touch, so Cyborg and I designed these.” He stepped forward and held out a bright yellow communicator, which Star Sapphire took and regarded curiously.

By then they had reached the police station, a square and rather squat structure. Star Sapphire looked up from the communicator and frowned.

“Please – this place houses containment cells?”

“Yeah.”

Star Sapphire gave the building one last uneasy glance before turning away. “I shall leave you here then. Thank you for your assistance in defeating the monster.”

Robin smiled. “No problem. When there’s trouble, you know who to call.”

)o(

She found another bench, this one in a “park.” The sounds of humanity were muted there, masked by the wind blowing through the various plant organisms. It was secluded. Peaceful.

She’d wanted to escape the fighting. And yet, there was no denying that Robin’s offer was tempting. To have a purpose, to belong… She wouldn’t be fighting for survival, this time. She remembered the feeling she’d had in her gem when she’d been fighting the Gordanians, fighting as much to protect four kind humans as to protect herself. It had been a nice feeling.

Without really noticing, Star Sapphire had pulled the communicator out of her skirts and begun to turn the small device in her hand. It fit comfortably in her palm, and she found its weight to be mildly reassuring. She thought of the four earthlings who had showed her “kindness.” She thought of their courageousness. She thought of friendship. She thought she had her answer.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a review if you like it, or if you have any questions ^_^ 
> 
> I'm thinking about drawing a scene from this chapter, partially for fun but partially so y'all can visualize Star Sapphire (and also the crazy squid-crab monster thing lol) better. She is indeed only 3 or 4 feet tall! I didn't make that clear the first time I published this on FFN, but hopefully that's clear now?


	3. Stepping Stones

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all can thank ThatOneGuy for this update today <3 
> 
> I'm uploading concept sketches for Star Sapphire to my tumblr, https://junipernight.tumblr.com/, and official illustrations will be added to this fic soon ^_^

Star Sapphire couldn’t help the pride that bubbled up in her chest when she looked up at the Tower. It was only a shell right now, but they had already overcome so many obstacles in its creation.

Robin had insisted that their team needed to work _with_ rather than against City Council, the local Human Authority. After the Gordanian invasion, the Authority had readily agreed to establishing a special unit of law enforcement. They had been considerably _less_ willing to grant them a site on which to build a base, however, and had only consented when someone had suggested the small rocky island, they’d celebrated their victory on. Star Sapphire surmised that no one else wanted it.

She could see why; Cyborg had arranged for some basic construction machinery and a crew of construction-humans to be barged to the island, but even with the equipment and the help it was a difficult terrain to work on.  Nonetheless Star Sapphire enjoyed the novelty of building something that wasn’t a spacecraft or a weapon, and she could see that the surrounding waters would be a tactical advantage once they finished. For now, the ocean and the late-morning sun merely provided a nice view. She flew inside to enjoy it with her friends.

)o(

Raven adjusted the corner of a sleeping bag. She shifted another one a bit to the right, so that the five were equally spaced in a circle, and then she adjusted it too. She reached to straighten another one before she caught herself and stopped.

There was no use hiding it from herself. She was nervous.

She would trust her new friends with her life – technically, she had entrusted it with them the very first time they met. So long as they didn’t know the truth about her, she was much safer here than where she’d been before. The question was, how long could she keep her secret? And could she trust herself with their lives?

What was she even doing here? The monks’ teachings had left no room for ambiguity on the subject of violence. It was wrong. It begot more violence. She couldn’t – shouldn’t – be doing this, she should never have agreed to fight the Gordanians in the first place. Even if she was allegedly fighting for the good of the Earth, _she_ wasn’t meant for good – how long would it be until she became used to violence? How long before the why’s stopped mattering? This could very well be a trick, meant to slowly draw out her darker nature until she became just like-

“Hey Rae!” Cyborg said as he walked into the room, unknowingly interrupting Fear’s ramblings in her head. “What’s good?”

Raven stopped zipping and unzipping a sleeping bag and shrugged.

She got the distinct impression she would be meditating a lot more from now on.

)o(

The first thing Robin bought after they finished the exterior walls of the tower was not mattresses or a camp stove; no, before any of that, he bought floor mats. Sleep could wait - training could not.

“Listen up!” He said, addressing his four new teammates. “Starting right now, it is our responsibility to protect innocent people and the city of Jump.”

He looked them each in the eye.

“It’ll be hard. Sometimes we’ll have to fight in less than ideal circumstances, which makes it that much more important that we’re at the top of our game. You need to be prepared for anything. That means knowing how to use your individual skills to your advantage, yes, but it also means knowing how to fight without them. It means knowing your strengths and weaknesses, and knowing how to fight hand-to-hand or from a distance, how to work together, how to be aware of your surroundings…”

Robin paused. He’d been about to yell CONSTANT VIGILANCE, just to startle them and make a point, but that was Batman’s style, not his.

“So… what do you guys already know?”                       

And thus training began. Beast Boy was the only other member on the team who’d ever been a super hero before, so he and Robin sparred first. Even as he was punching and pivoting, Robin was evaluating his team mate. Beast Boy was creative in his animal choices, and able to shift and make decisions quickly, but he was barely more capable of fighting as a human than the people they protected.

Cyborg had taken mixed martial arts when he was a kid, and he remembered the basic forms and techniques, but a lot of his ability could be chalked up to his raw strength and nerves of steel (or perhaps titanium.)

Star Sapphire wasn’t made for fighting, but she was pretty damned used to it by now. So when Robin said to give it her best shot, she summoned her energy and fired. He flipped back, the burning plasma narrowly missing his chest and searing the ends of his cape. He landed with a skid.

 “Whoa! Time out!” He said, making a T with his hands. “Holy-” he cut himself off before he could finish the batty old joke. “Those are hot!”

“My powers are derived from solar energy,” Star Sapphire stated, as though it were all very obvious.

“Yeah, I can see that.” Robin said, flapping his cape and looking at the scorch marks that now decorated the otherwise gleaming gym. He swallowed. “Um… in the future, try to avoid throwing solar energy at anyone flammable.”

Star Sapphire quirked her head. “But, how will I know…?”

“We’ll tell you.”

Finally, it was Raven’s turn. Her mannerisms reminded Robin a bit of Batgirl. The difference was that Cassandra was the same height as him – more than a head taller than Raven – and had been trained by one of the greatest assassin’s in the world. Raven seemed like more of a shield-person.

“What’s your combat experience?”

“The Gordanians,” she said. “That’s it.”

Robin nodded. Then he charged.

A moment later, he was dangling a few feet off the ground, firmly trapped in the grip of cold, black energy. He grinned at Raven.

“Nice-” he complimented, before he pushed against the energy, felt it give enough for him to twist and drop out of its hold, snaked forward, and flipped her over in almost the exact same maneuver he’d used on Beast Boy.

“-but you still have a lot to learn in martial arts. From the top then.” He said to everyone, taking a moment to give her a hand off the floor before he launched into a lecture on which parts of the hands and feet to strike with if you didn’t want to break your own bones.

)o(

No sooner had Cyborg finished installing the alert system than it began blaring.

Robin’s eyes narrowed. “Trouble.”

There was indeed trouble, and it was in the Frankling Gotham District of the Arts - the only district of Jump City where crosswalk dance numbers were more common than any other illegal activity. In general, the Frank Goth was prone to radical and sometimes illegible acts of guerilla art. Most of it was harmless, albeit of questionable legality, but Robin had pored over the police records, and it was amazing how violently creative people could be with modeling clay. 

In the borderland between the Frank Goth and downtown stood the Jump City Metropolitan Museum of Art. The crown jewels of its current exhibits were made of glass, not precious minerals, but that didn’t stop the blue man in the red-lined cape from levitating them into his top hat. One by one, intricate lamps and stained-glass windows contorted to fit though the brim. The hat suddenly shivered in his hands, and the masked magician looked up to find that he’d gained an audience.

 “Now, who the heck are you?”

 _Good question_ , thought Raven, but Robin didn’t hesitate.

 “We’re the ones who’re gonna take you down!”

“That’s a bit of a mouthful,” said the blue man. “Me, I’m simply the Amazing _Mumbo Jumbo!”_ At these last words, his wand glowed and a spiraling vortex of white rabbits leapt out.

Raven immediately flew higher – could normal rabbits jump that high? And did they normally have fangs?

Robin’s voice cut through Mumbo’s cackles. “Star, no fire!” Already he was deflecting the barrage with his bo staff and weaving through backlit irises and ironwork trees as he ran toward Mumbo.

Hovering over the madcap glass garden, Raven began raising shields that, while small, prevented the furry ammunition from pelting her friends. Mumbo renewed the attack by animating several fancy floor lamps; they hopped forward, swinging their heavy shades violently. Star Sapphire and dinosaur-Beast Boy returned charge, while Raven managed damage control from above, simultaneously trying to shield her friends and preserve the earthly artifacts. Cyborg, however, had been focused on aiming his sonic cannon at Mumbo, and a whack from the dragonfly-bedecked head of a stray lamp sent him sprawling.

Robin had also been targeting Mumbo, and he was nearly in striking distance of the theatrical thief when Mumbo announced that he was going out for a stroll and proceeded to step _into_ a stained-glass window.

He reappeared on the other side of the gallery a moment later, stepping out of the mountainous window panel near where Cyborg was rubbing his head

“I’m ba-ack!” He sang, only to crouch next to Cyborg with a look of exaggerated concern on his face. “Why, hold on sir, there’s something in your ear… aha!” He pulled out several coins, then threw them at Beast Boy and Star Sapphire.

“Keep the change!” He shouted, cackling gleefully when the coins exploded.

Robin was en route back to their side of the gallery, deflecting and dodging vicious rabbits with every step. “Raven, stop him!” He shouted.

Raven held up a hand to do so, but she hesitated-

just long enough for a multicolored scarf to bind her arms and yank her out of the air in one move.

Raven landed hard. She very awkwardly just managed to not hit her head, and it took her a long moment to find her balance and sit up. It took another moment to scatter the group or flock or – Beast Boy would know the word – of rabbits… which admittedly seemed more interested in sinking their vicious teeth into her cloak than her leg.

 She stood just in time to see Cyborg blast the wand from Mumbo’s hand. Mumbo dove after it - but it was Robin who caught it and snapped it neatly in two.

“Show’s over, Mumbo.”

To Raven’s surprise, Mumbo’s spells broke with his wand; the lamps became rigid and still once more, the rabbits disappeared with a puff of smoke, Mumbo’s hat emptied its loot before disappearing, and the scarf around her arms loosened and vanished. Raven immediately tugged her hood back up and shrank into her cloak.

Mumbo – now considerably less blue and well-dressed – made a break for the door, but this time Raven had no reservations about strapping his arms together and picking him off the ground with a shadow of soul-self.   

Mumbo struggled for a second, then sighed. “I don’t suppose you’d be interested in an encore?”

)o(

There was someone reading in the Central Operations Room when Star Sapphire decided to retire for the day.

It took her a moment to recognize Raven without her hood up. Star Sapphire had wondered if perhaps the hood was part of her form, but apparently beneath it the Hooded One had purple hair – short, stylish hair, like a pearl. It curved around her cheeks, framing dark eyes and— _and a red crystal on her forehead._ Star Sapphire gasped. Raven looked up.

“I didn’t realize you were a gem-”

 “ _Don’t call me that!”_

Star Sapphire was startled by the flash of indeterminable emotion that crossed her friend’s face, and then she was confused and a little offended.

“Sorry. I guess that means something different on my world from yours,” Raven muttered. “Excuse me,” Raven yanked her hood back over her forehead, and stalked out, never once looking up or back. Star Sapphire was left alone in the cavernous empty room… but not for long. Beast Boy and Cyborg’s joking tones drifted up the stairwell, and within a few moments they had joined her.

“Hey Star, what’s up?”

This Earth-expression had already been explained to Star Sapphire. “Little is up, my friends,” she lied.

“I thought everyone would be in the Ops room by now. Where’s Raven?”

“She just left.”

“And Robin?”

“I believe she is still working.”

For some reason, Beast Boy and Cyborg began to snigger at this. Once more Star Sapphire was confused, but Earth always made her feel so, and at least these two of her friends were present and in a good humor.

“Please – I have made the joke?”

“Star Sapphire, Robin’s a boy.”

“I am aware of the existence of the human categories “boy” and “girl,” but I am unsure of their significance.”

“Uh…”

“Well…You see-”

There followed a long and very confusing explanation about the difference between “boy” and “girl,” or maybe the lack of difference, and the conclusion that it didn’t matter _too_ much, but that Star Sapphire should probably learn to tell anyway.

They were still trying to explain the intricacies of hair and human gender expression when they were saved by the arrival of Robin, who came bearing pizzas and a side of thoughts.

“I’ve been thinking…” he said. “We can’t just keep calling it ‘The Team.’ We need a name.”

“Ooh-ooh, can we be the Super Patrol?!” Beast Boy asked, both easily distracted and desperate to change the topic.

Robin rubbed his neck awkwardly. “Well, everything is kinda marked “T” for Team right now, including the Tower, so the new name should probably also start with T…” Robin looked around at the three of his teammates present; there wasn’t much they had in common. “Maybe the Teen-Team? Never mind, that sounds lame.”

Star Sapphire watched her teammates bemusedly. She was still not very confident in her understanding of names, though her teammates were able to procure many of them.

 “How about the Tigers! Or the Triceratops? Maybe the Timber Wolves?”

Cyborg gave Beast Boy a playful shove before he could come up with any more bad-suggestions before he gave his own. “What about the ‘Titans?’”

“Hey, that’s good!”

Star Sapphire frowned. “I am not sure I understand this word,” she admitted.

Cyborg froze – he’d first thought of ‘Titan’ because it’d been the mascot at the school he attended before The Accident – but luckily Robin could supply a definition more satisfying than ‘some powerful dudes from Greek mythology.’ (Mythology had been his least favorite English unit. Too much family drama.)

“It means someone who’s really powerful and a leader in their field,” Robin explained, wiping the pizza grease off his gloves.

Beast Boy was nodding enthusiastically. “Yeah, that totally fits! We’ll be the Teen Titans!”

)o(

Raven spent the early evening circling the skeletal T-Tower, etching runes every seven steps until she’d constructed a rudimentary ward over the entirety of the island. Despite the smallness of the island it was still a time-consuming process and the sandy dampness of the work only made the passage of time seem slower. When she was done, she stood awhile, just listening to the slither of waves over rock and watching the moon rise over the open ocean.  

The first thing the others did upon her return was to collectively declare that they’d come up with a new name, and wasn’t it awesome, and didn’t she think Teen Titans was the coolest team name ever?

Titans? She blinked. Half-articulated thoughts and images of cruel, grotesque creatures and scuttling humans in togas dodging flaming pits, flashed across her mind. Could they have chosen a _worse name?_ The Titans of Greek mythology didn’t exist, of course, but the beings who’d inspired the tales were all too real. Did they…?

She glanced at each of their faces, gauging their emotional states. There was no suspicion, no subterfuge, and not even a whiff of demonic magic.

She was being paranoid. However, they _would_ notice something was up if she didn’t respond soon. She couldn’t protest without giving an explanation, so she took a slice of cold pizza and neutrally stated that it was as good a name as any. Cyborg and Beast Boy seemed disappointed in her non-reaction, but the more she thought about it, the less she cared.

It was just a name.


	4. Star Burst

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Titans go to the fair.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Asterism: noun, (1) a cluster of stars (2) a star-shaped figure of reflected light exhibited by some crystals

The Ferris wheel began its ascent shortly before the sky exploded.

Star Sapphire gawked at the fiery rainbow ripping apart the night, but quickly shifted her attention from sky to earth. Up here on the slow-moving Ferris wheel, they would be an easy target. They needed to move fast and get somewhere they could defend but also fight from… Star Sapphire was prepared to leap out of the pod when a hand on her shoulder stopped her.

“Whoa, easy!” said Robin. “They’re just fireworks.”

“Fire – works?” she asked, without taking her eyes off the dangerously polychromatic sparks.

“They’re mini-rockets people send into the sky to make colorful explosions.”

“But why?”

Robin shrugged. “The lights are pretty.”

Star Sapphire kept one foot on the rail. “On Homeworld, such explosions would mean the Gordanians are attacking. You are certain Earth is not under attack?”

“Positive,” Robin reassured with a grin before he turned back to the light display.

He seemed awfully confident for someone who’s city had been invaded by Gordanians just a few months ago, and Star was about to tell him that when a vision overcame her-

_Robin and an oddly familiar girl riding a Ferris wheel. A strange machine abducting the familiar stranger, trying to take her to space. A battle. Her friends saving the girl and destroying the machine._

She was brought abruptly back to reality by an excited whoop from Robin.

“Here comes the finale! Yeah!” He shouted. “Woo-hoo!”

“You okay?” asked a quieter voice. Star Sapphire turned to see that Raven was staring at her.

“I am fine,” she said, blinking away the last of the vision. “It is only that the fireworks… make me nervous.” She flushed, embarrassed to admit to something so weak, but Raven merely nodded.

“Me too,” she whispered.

Star Sapphire was relieved the sentiment was mutual, but Robin looked at Raven oddly.

“Have you ever been to a carnival?” he asked, as the last (alleged) firework faded away.

“We don’t have them where I’m from,” Raven said.

“No carnivals?!” Robin repeated in disbelief. “Where are you from?”

“Azarath.” Raven’s already subtle expressions were impossible for Robin to make out in the double darkness of the night and her hood.

“Never heard of it. Is it in America?” He asked.

“No.”

There was an awkward pause. Then Robin continued, “I never would’ve guessed. You don’t have an accent at all.”

Raven was silent, watching the glowing fairground below get steadily closer. Eventually she said, “My mom was from Earth.”

“… And you are not?” Star Sapphire queried.

Raven just shrugged, but behind Star Sapphire’s bangs, there were suddenly extra asterisms in her eye.

They left the Ferris wheel and ventured into the rows of tents. Robin showed them carnival food, and various games, making a point to direct his explanations at both of the girls now. Star took a special delight in the cotton candy and the elephant ears, with their strange names and sugary flavors, and wanted to try everything, despite the fact that she didn’t actually need to eat. Raven took one bite of a fried oreo, gagged, and then refused to try anything else. The irony was not lost on Robin.

Star enjoyed the introduction to a new facet of human culture, though she remained anxious the entire night; she couldn’t stop seeing things. Around every corner and in the funhouse mirrors – _People wearing red masks and breathing fire – Four humans and a talking dog being chased by a monster – That same, oddly familiar girl in purple being attacked by strange machines and a second girl in armor_.

Star Sapphire never got this many visions. It felt like something big should be happening, something calamitous and related to the carnival, but nothing happened. Not in reality, anyway. Only in her useless visions. Star Sapphire tried to remind herself that that was a good thing.

She did her best to stifle any reactions and enjoy the festivities for the rest of the night. She thought Raven noticed anyway, but since she didn’t comment on it, Star spent the rest of the night hanging off Raven’s arm and comparing Earth to Homeworld in an attempt to learn more about Raven’s planet – not that Raven revealed anything more. Not that Star Sapphire succeeded in escaping her own dread.

They made it back to the tower without anything terrible happening, despite the maddening string of impossible realities that promised otherwise. And in the – finished! – home she and her friends had built, no further visions plagued her.

She finally felt all was safe. Star Sapphire attributed her nerves to the fireworks and the HIVE attack last week and went to bed hugging a giant chicken from Beast Boy and Cyborg, reflecting that she must be the luckiest gem in the whole universe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CHAPTER 2 HAS STAR SAPPHIRE'S PICTURE NOW!!! :D
> 
> I hope this chapter answers some questions! By the way, have you noticed how popular fairs/carnivals/amusement parks are as settings in cartoons? Virtual cookies to you if you can guess the other cartoons referenced in this chapter.


	5. Graphite

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When Star-Sapphire first crash landed in Jump City.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No new chapter this weekend - it's finals season and I have 4 papers in 2 languages + 0 patience for words right now X'D - but please enjoy this painting until next weekend when GARNET makes an appearance :D


	6. Jailhouse Rock

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Howdy, bang.

The entire prison was shaking.

This was not, Garnet knew, typical behavior for a human structure.

She peeked around the corner of a concrete wall then snuck down the brightly lit hallway, passing multiple security cameras and an empty room with an abandoned card game.

 It was highly probable that the guards had been pulled from their station to deal with the giant rock-monster Garnet had glimpsed in visions earlier. The Crystal Gems had helped apprehend the monster in the first place, before they’d realized he wasn’t a corrupted gem, but Cinderblock wasn’t why she was here tonight.

She turned into another hallway, this one lined with rattling bars. No one looked out at her, and she tried not to look too long at them, uncomfortable with the idea of conscious imprisonment. Most of the prisoners were curled tight with their pillows over their ears, their beds quaking every few seconds. Garnet crept slowly and quietly towards the metal door at the end of the hall, stopping whenever a particularly loud crash rocked the building.

She had one hand on the doorknob when she heard pounding footsteps from the other side. The events of the night were flowing faster than she’d anticipated -

The door slammed open.

“Cinderblock is this way!” shouted a police officer to five colorfully dressed teens behind him. They sprinted down the hall, capes billowing behind them.

‘Funny,’ Garnet thought, from where she was stretched flat against the ceiling. ‘I thought super-heroes were human-fiction.’ She dropped down and reeled her arms back in to their normal length.

Someone started giggling maniacally behind her. Garnet spun around

A tiny girl in an orange jumpsuit had woken up and was staring at her through the bars. It took effort not to stare back at her pink hair and diamond eyes.

Garnet didn’t show her disquiet; she simply held a finger to her lips. The woman snorted and gave her two thumbs up. She did a quick check that no one else had seen, then slipped through the heavy door.

At the end of the next featureless brightly lit hallway was metal door number 3-901.

The prison cells inside this room were _tiny,_ no bigger than fish tanks. There was a small angry garden gnome struggling to stay upright, a miniature robot who had resigned himself to the wills of gravity, a red floppy disk, a frog in a knight’s helmet, a porcelain doll in a bubble-wrap straight jacket... Garnet stopped at a tank with a bouncing Chinese takeout box. The red and white container was slowly coming apart, jolting open with the force of Cinderblock’s rage down the hall. A purple agate poked between the paper folds and began to glow-

Garnet punched through the glass and grabbed it. A moment later, and the corrupted gem had been bubbled and banished to the temple without reforming so much as a claw; crisis averted.

That’s when the alarm started blasting.

Garnet huffed and caught the door before it could lock.

Her feet were light as she dashed through the corridors. The prison was on high alert, with teams of guards running in every direction to locate their escaped inmate, but Garnet knew how to make all the right turns, and Cinderblock was still causing chaos and generally keeping Jump City State Penitentiary short of staff.

She made it back to the prison courtyard with about 2 seconds to spare. With a powerful spring, Garnet cleared the outer wall with a single leap and no witnesses. Behind her, the searchlights belatedly sprung to life with a clatter that echoed through the scrub-land.

Garnet sprinted through the tall grasses, sage brushing past her calves. The blaring alarm faded, until it melded into the sounds of the insects.

Garnet kept running for a long time, until she reached a forest. It was stunted and twisted, nothing like the forest she’d come into being in so many millennia ago, but it was charming all the same. She stopped at the warp pad to watch the sun rise over the chaparral. A hare tried to nibble on her foot. Helicopters passed overhead, but she was in tune with the matter of the universe, indistinguishable from the rocks and brush…

~)o(~

“Steven Bomb!”

The weapon of mass compassion bounced on her thick hair.

“I got you!” He crowed

“You got me,” she agreed.

“And now you’re blind!” He covered her eyes.

“Tiny hands. My only weakness.”

She pulled him off of her head and into her arms.

“What did you do today?” He asked.

She’d saved a whole building full of humans from having to deal with _two_ giant rock monsters. Or she’d broken into prison to steal a to-go box. Both were true, really.

“What do _you_ think I did?”

She could see the moment Steven’s vivid imagination left reality as they knew it. What followed was a vivid and whimsical tale of tricksters and secret talking animal friends and a Garnet-who-was-not-quite-Garnet who needed to be strong to protect her most favoritest person in the world, which reminded her of Mr. Improbable. Actually, now that she thought about that, she suspected today’s adventures had been inspired by Kung Fu Bunny. They’d watched that movie together 8 times so far. It warmed Garnet’s heart to know that Steven still saw them that way – as wondrous and magical and “hardcore” and heroic – even though he was fast coming into his own as a Crystal Gem too.

“And then you came back here. And I got you. And you were blind. And that's what you did today!”

He was so excited he was doing jazz hands. Garnet loved when he did his little jazz hands.

“Yeah, that's pretty much what happened,” she said.

Steven’s eyes got still brighter. “Really?”

“No.”

“Aww,” Steven sighed as she lowered him to the floor. Garnet walked into the kitchen and began preparing Steven breakfast. (Terrible things would happen if Steven tried to use the waffle iron when Amethyst got up in half an hour.)

“Are you sure you don’t have secret talking animal friends I’m not ready to know about?” Steven asked, still trailing behind her.

“Very sure… because I have secret superhero friends you’re not ready to know about!”

Steven gasped and immediately began peppering her with questions and pleading to meet these real-life super friends.

She ruffled his curls. “Soon.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Heyo~! Thanks for sticking with me. I'm so tired from this month, but I'm also so excited to be posting this chapter. Not only is this the first chapter with Garnet and Steven, this is also the first entirely new chapter I'm adding to this fic. The previous chapters have all been edits ( _extensive_ edits) of the chapters I originally posted on FFN like... 2 years ago? 
> 
> Anyhow, next chapter I think will be another brand new, as-yet-unwritten chapter, but after that is Switched, and I am pumped!
> 
> Please leave a review! :D


	7. Take a Bite Out of the Silver Sandwich

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: MaeWho has me very curious now – what’s your favorite chapter been so far?

Normally, Star Sapphire enjoyed listening to their opponent’s banter.

The exchange of clever words and insults seemed to be a requirement in earthly combat, with each side throwing puns as well as punches. Star Sapphire didn’t contribute much, but she listened. Sometimes the hidden implications of words were beyond her understanding, but each new double-meaning she discovered delighted her.

“Your pathetic skills can’t outshine the brilliance of Dr. Light!”

Yes, normally Star Sapphire enjoyed banter, but the so-called Dr. Light displeased her immensely.

“Star, no fire!” Robin shouted, and Star Sapphire let the solar power fade from her grasp with a huff.

Without her star bolts to throw, she had to opt for hand-to-hand combat, dive bombing with her fists out, but before she got close enough to hit, Dr. Light threw a metal capsule at her. In a flash, a glowing yellow dome had come down over her head.

Star Sapphire poked it. The dome was solid beneath her finger – it wasn’t even real light!

Dr. Light started unleashing yet more terrible puns along with his stupid, not-actually-light-based-because-he-was-flimsy-and-flammable projectiles. He blinded Beast Boy with a few bright flashes, which was reasonable, but then he encased Cyborg with stone, which defied logic and thematic consistency. Star Sapphire grumbled to herself and started radiating star light again.  

The faux-light dome melted easy as mercury beneath her palms. She looked around for a telephone pole or something else she could weaponize – hey, why didn’t she just _carry_ a weapon instead of ripping up infrastructure? – and instead saw her teammate hunched over the asphalt, Dr. Light standing over her.

“Raven!” she cried.

Dr. Light was smirking, his hands igniting with artificial light. “What’s the matter? Afraid of the light?”

Every shadow on the street suddenly broke free of their bindings and rushed underfoot, swirling around Raven until she was no longer Raven at all. A massive something, dark and narrow and with too many limbs loomed over the pathetic Dr. Light.

_“What’s the matter?”_ she taunted in guttural, hissing, spitting voices. _“Afraid of the dark?”_

Star Sapphire simultaneously wanted to embrace Raven tightly and flee the planet. Instead she stood there uselessly, cemented to the spot. Dr. Light screamed. Every shadow in the city seemed to be circling in on them, moving too fast to comprehend, blocking out the light-

“Raven, stop!” Robin ran towards her, grappling hook out and ready.

But Raven didn’t need restraining; at Robin’s shout, she had suddenly come back to herself and shrunk back down to size. Dr. Light emerged from under the shadow of her receding cloak, shaking, the gadgetry on his suit utterly mangled. Star hadn’t even noticed his disappearance.

Robin knelt over the quaking Dr. Light, while Beast Boy stayed back and just looked at him.

“Dude, Raven, what did you do?”

“So – dark – make it stop – make it stop-”

Cyborg and Star Sapphire ignored the fallen villain and rushed over to where their teammate was simply standing, immobile.

She looked fine now - no extra limbs in sight.  Tentatively Cyborg laid his hand on her shoulder.

Raven whirled around and _hissed_ at them; Cyborg jerked his hand back as if he expected her to bite. With one last blood-red glare, she stalked away.

“What is her deal?!” Asked Beast Boy as all four of them watched her fade into the night.

No one had an answer.

Star Sapphire quickly forgot Dr. light, his annoying puns, and his sloppy approach to his craft. The only lights on her mind that night as she lay in bed were the two glowing red slits she’d seen under Raven’s hood.

~)o(~

Raven wasn’t at breakfast the next day.

That wasn’t totally unusual. Raven rarely came out of her room for more than a couple hours each day, as if she could only handle small doses of the other Titan’s presence. Often, she brought a book out with her, or else chose a corner to meditate in. Dinner and training were the only times she ever really gave the other Titans her full attention.

Cyborg and Beast Boy were arguing over the composition of their breakfast (“THAT'S NOT EGGS! THAT'S THAT TOFU STUFF!”) when Raven entered the Ops room.

She swept past them silently and beelined for the kettle. She hoped to get in, get tea, and get out–  

“Hey Raven!”

 –but fate had never been so kind as that. 

Raven stared blankly at the kettle. She could feel Him stirring again, in the darkest corner of her mind, and she took up her mental chant again. Breath in, Azarath Metrion Zinthos. Breath out, Azarath Metrion Zinthos.

“Wakey-wakey, tofu eggs and bakey.” Beast Boy sung, like some improbably green cereal mascot selling sugar to children on TV. Breath in, Azarath Metrion Zinthos. The kettle began to sing in a low voice, its contents warm but not yet piping. It took Raven a moment to realize that the flickering in the corner of her eye was Beast Boy with a spatula, and not just the nerve in her eye that always throbbed when she meditated through the night. Sweet Azar, she needed caffeine. Breath in, Azarath Metrion Zinthos.

Over Raven’s shoulder, Beast Boy could see Cyborg making ‘stop’ motions, but he ignored him, thrusting the frying pan closer.

“C’mon, just one little taste! You could use a little food after the way you cooked Dr. Light.”

Breath in, Azarath Metrion Z- _You cooked no one last night. But you could. And you will, Raven. The Earth is going to **burn**_

“NO!”

There was food everywhere. Her friends were all gaping at her.

Raven barely glanced at their faces before she fled. The doors whooshed shut behind her.

Robin carefully set his coffee down. “… Maybe you should go apologize.”

“Me?” asked Beast Boy, shaking the tofu out of his hair. “I'm not the one who just turned breakfast into a battlefield!”

“Yeah, but after the weirdness that went down last night, you should know better than to go messing with her,” Cyborg said, siding with Robin.

“I was trying to be nice. But no matter how hard I try, she still treats me like tofu eggs!” Cyborg didn’t react to this pronouncement. He just got up to wash the dishes.

Beast Boy tried again. “You know, she's never once laughed at any of my jokes?!”

“Least she listens. I just kinda tune you out.”

Beast Boy’s mouth screwed up.

“Raven’s complicated,” said Robin. “We’re not always gonna understand her.” Broody people were just Like That sometimes, Robin knew. He had a lot of experience to go off of.

Beast Boy did not. “Then how are we supposed to deal with her? How can we even trust her? I mean--

“She is our friend!” Star Sapphire interjected, offended. “Of course we trust her. We protect each other. We are the ‘nice’ to each other. That is what friends do for each other, is it not?”

“Yeah,” Beast Boy admitted, “but- “

“Many of your earthly ways are still strange to me. Some of your customs even frighten me. But I trust you all. Because you are all my friends,” Star said firmly.

~)o(~

An hour had gone by, and Star Sapphire still could think of nothing else but Raven.

“Robin? I am worried for our friend,” she said.

Robin finally gave up on channel surfing and muted the TV.  “Me too,” He admitted. “But in my experience, it’s best to give people a day or two to sort things out for themselves before you try talking to them.”

“But Cyborg always says to give medical intervention immediately!”

“Wait… what?”

Star couldn’t sit still. She began pacing. “What if we wait a day or two, and she has already… gone Wrong, like the gem we imprisoned?”

“Star Sapphire, Raven’s not a gem.”

Star’s mouth screwed up. “She is also not human.”

They stared each other down, domino mask against impenetrable orange fringe.

“Coincidentally, the gem creature we contained together also possessed abnormal height and excess limbs. You know, the purple gem that went Wrong and proceeded to attack the skyscrapers in downtown.”

Raven wasn’t a gem. Robin knew for a fact that Raven wasn’t a gem, and he had the file in the med bay to prove it. But damn, this child-sized alien with her poufy skirt and her face half hidden behind her hair knew how to make an extremely convincing argument.

“Fine,” Robin conceded. “Let’s go check on her.”

~)o(~

Finding Raven’s door removed from its frame did nothing to reassure Star Sapphire. Robin wasn’t sure if she had eyebrows, but the tilt of her chin seemed to say see? Told you.

“She has disappeared! Now how will we find her?”

Robin frowned at the door, knowing Raven hated to lose control, hated to be destructive, even in combat.

“… I have a hunch I know where she is.”

~)o(~

As he had expected, they found Raven on the roof. She was meditating on the far side of the tower, facing away from the city and the volleyball net and towards the open ocean.

“Raven!” He called, letting her know they were there. She made no reaction to their approach. “…You okay? We stopped by your room and the door’s been knocked down.”

Raven cackled.

Then, abruptly, she stopped. “Need to be alone,” she muttered as she hurried away.

Star Sapphire was giving him that Look again, through her fringe, Robin was sure of it.

“Okay, that was pretty weird, but that doesn’t mean it was the Wrongness.”

“We do not know what the early stages of Wrongness look like.”

“But we do know that Raven is physiologically more human than not – Cyborg took her medical stats, remember? – and humans don’t randomly sprout extra limbs or become giant monsters.” Not without some serious radioactivity or hazardous chemicals involved… Come to think of it, he should probably find out if Jump City had any Superfund sites they should know about.

Star Sapphire remembered the day Robin was talking about. The others had all extracted blood, and taken each other’s temperatures, and filled out a data file, but such things were pointless for her. She had tried to explain that to Cyborg, but she hadn’t quite been able to convince him that if she could not repair herself, or she would be irreparable. Just like she could not convince Robin that Raven might be going Wrong.

“Well if it is not the Wrongness, what do you think is wrong with her?”

Robin stared out over the water, considering.

“I think,” he began slowly, “that Raven still struggles with the idea of violence, even when it is used for good. I’ve noticed she tries to stick to defense in battle.”

“She did not stick to mere defense last night.”

“No, but the rest of us were all down – _temporarily_ , but you know what I mean – when she finally fought back. Ditto for the explosion she caused on the Gordanians’ ship. And both times it looked like she didn’t mean to do as much damage as she did. That sort of cognitive dissonance can be very distressing.”

 “Alright, then. What earthly treatment do you prescribe for this “distress”?”

~)o(~

The tea was steeping, the chicken noodle soup was steaming, and the cookies were neatly arranged on a little plate. Star Sapphire placed a spoon and a napkin on the baking sheet, and then the movable feast was complete. (Robin made a note to himself to get an actual tray with a cover later, and then immediately felt like _such_ a rich kid. But hey! They were useful kitchenware with practical functions!)

Raven didn’t answer when they knocked, so they left the tray of comfort food next to her door.

“Now what?” Star Sapphire asked.

Robin shrugged. “She needs time to be alone.”

Star Sapphire sighed a great heaving sigh (a nonverbal human expression she was growing very fond of) and slumped against the wall.

_A flying spaghetti monster, rising over the Jump City skyline, wiggling its noodle-y appendages._

She needed something to distract herself with, or she was going to go Wrong herself.

“… Robin? Could you teach me to use a weapon?”

~)o(~

“Yeah, like that!”

He made another swing with his bo staff, and Star-Sapphire turned and blocked it with her own. He went for a low sweep and she jumped, levitating down softly a few feet away.

Star Sapphire was a fast learner. Plus, she was strong enough that hardly anyone on the planet would be able to pin her staff down. They’d only been working at the bo staff for a couple of hours, but already she’d mastered enough katas that he’d decided to challenge her to a real spar.

He charged her, miming a low sweep and then going for a thrust instead. She moved to block again, but the end of her staff dragged upon the floor, where it moved too slowly to stop him from knocking her off her feet.

“Ooh, sorry.”

Robin offered her a hand. Star Sapphire, recognizing the gesture, accepted it. She let him help her to her feet, but she forgot the part where you were supposed to let go, as she had yet to realize the cultural implications of unnecessary handholding. Robin, who was very familiar with the cultural implications of unnecessary handholding, blushed.

“Anyway… I could make you a shorter bo staff if you want to keep learning. Something customized for you.”

“Maybe,” Star said, considering the metal staff in her hands. “I like the bo staff, but I wish to try more weapons first.”

“That’s cool. Do you wanna try them now?”

Robin finally let go of her hand and buried his head in a cabinet on the edge of the gym.

“Let’s see, we’ve got kendo swords, bows and arrows, num-chuks…”

He looked over his shoulder, but Star Sapphire didn’t seem to be paying close attention. She had her communicator out and was checking the screen.

“It’s been almost three hours,” she reported. “I’m going to see if she accepted the offering.”

~)o(~

Raven had not touched the tray or, probably, seen it at all, and Star Sapphire had reached her limit.

“Please! Let us simply—"

Robin pulled her fist away from the door, but Star Sapphire kept trying to knock. Not that she was trying very hard. Meanwhile, Robin was throwing his whole weight into pulling her back. “Raven asked us not to disturb her!”

“She could be weeping and-"

“I don't want to bother her!”

“But if we merely-”

The door whooshed open, Star Sapphire stopped trying to knock, and Robin fell on his butt. Which was embarrassing. He flipped smoothly to his feet, and stared at Beast Boy and Cyborg, who had just come out of _Raven’s room_. With _Raven!_ All three were sweaty and covered with grit, but smiling. Beast Boy looked like he’d been attacked by seagulls. A corner of Raven’s cloak was still smoldering.

Any notions about _tact_ and _privacy_ left his head and he asked, “Where have you guys _been_?”

All three of them shared a look.

“… Just getting to know each other,” Cyborg said cryptically, for which Raven looked grateful.

“And now we’re gonna go cook a totally awesome breakfast 2.0!” Beast Boy exclaimed. “Race ya to the kitchen!”

“Oh no you don’t,” Cyborg shouted, already running after him. “This time we’re having real eggs!”

“Isn’t it a little late for breakfast?” Robin asked. Pointlessly, as they were already out of sight.

Raven shrugged and started walking. “Mealtimes are a social construct.”

“But we made you soup!” Star exclaimed. Raven looked down and noticed that Star Sapphire was, indeed, carrying a tray with soup and cookies.

“Oh. Thanks,” she said, belatedly accepting the tray. It looked like she was going to be offered a lot of food tonight.

“Would you like to share it?”

~)o(~

Beast Boy and Cyborg were once again arguing about the composition of breakfast foods. However, this time it was mostly jocular; there were certain experiences that made ideological disagreements about food seem unimportant, and one of those experiences happened to be being unexpectedly warped into an alternate dimension to face off against the demonic mental representation of a friend’s father issues.

Robin was still more than a little confused what, exactly, could have happened behind closed doors to cause all this, but he was happy about the new team dynamic, so he decided to focus on making a strong pot of coffee and not question it.

Raven – who was a terrible cook and knew it – and Star Sapphire – who was a terrible cook and didn’t know it – stayed at the table. They watched the earthlings bustle in the kitchen as they sipped at magically reheated chicken noodle soup. It was delicious soup, though Star Sapphire wasn’t sure how it was medicinal. Maybe if she dipped the cookies in the soup-?

“Hey, Star?” Raven asked suddenly.

“Yes?”

“Thanks for sticking up for me earlier. And for respecting my privacy,” Raven said. “And for the soup,” she added as an afterthought, her ashen lips quirking into a fleeting smile. “That means a lot to me.”

Star Sapphire put down her spoon and looked at Raven in confusion. “But clearly you were distressed and in need of companionship, and had we ignored your privacy sooner you would have felt better sooner!”  Star Sapphire exclaimed, motioning at BB and Cyborg, the latter of whom was having his mind blown by vegan butter.

“Maybe, maybe not. Today was a bit exceptional,” Raven mused. 

“But then… I still do not know how best to act as your friend.”

Raven thought about that. There wasn’t any one solution to this problem, was there? Because she needed her alone time. She needed distance to keep her emotions under strict control, and privacy to research… sensitive topics if she was to have any chance of preventing Armageddon. But clearly, today would have been a lost battle if not for Cyborg and Beast Boy’s intrusion. And the price would have been her free will, if not the Earth itself.

“How about this?” she said, as the guys brought over platters of hash browns and plant- and animal-based eggs and bacon. “I’ll ask you for help when I need it if you respect my privacy the rest of the time. Deal?”

Star Sapphire beamed, and they shook on it.

“Sounds like a good plan to me,” Robin commented.

“Cheers!” Cyborg said, holding up a coke, and they all clinked their glasses. “To fighting crime _and_ each other’s inner demons!”

If Raven nearly choked on her tea, it went unnoticed.

“Cheers!”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: This was supposed to be short! A fragment! A mere snippet of a chapter! Not the entire episode! Gjidfanfdoajgidfkas;l
> 
> (oh well, I'm really happy with this chapter anyway)
> 
> Quick question: Does everyone know what I mean by Ops room? That’s the word I’ve always used, but I probably got it from ye olde fandom and not the show itself. It’s short for Operations, and it refers to the Living Room/Command Center thing with the big windows and the giant couch and the supercomputer.
> 
> Don’t forget to review! :D


	8. Out of Body Experience

She saw it in a movie: clothing. Adornment worn on top of one’s form, rather than as an integrated part. In a few moments, one could change clothes, change colors, change identities even! It was an utterly fascinating concept to Star Sapphire. The cultural associations and statements conveyed by adornment were also very confusing, however, so it was not a subject Star wanted to learn on her own.

She went to the ops room in search of a friend, but it appeared to be empty. Then she noticed a lone figure, quietly hovering by the window with her legs crossed and her eyes closed. Star Sapphire hesitated; Raven was a fellow outsider to the customs of Earth, and Star Sapphire wished they could do the “bonding” over that… but Raven did not seem to want to spend any more time with friends than she had to, and she had literally just thanked Star Sapphire for leaving her alone the day before.

 “Have you seen Robin?” She called out instead.

Without turning around, Raven said, “no,” and nothing more.

“Oh… then perhaps you have seen Cyborg?”

“No.”

“Beast Boy?”

“My eyes are closed, Star Sapphire, I haven’t _seen_ anyone.”

Star Sapphire hummed in thought. She thought she detected a note of hostility, but then decided she must be imagining it – Raven’s voice was just as flat as it always was.

“They must be hanging out someplace. Perhaps we should do the hanging out together! We never have before, and conceivably it could be fun. We might journey to the mall of shopping, or perform braiding maneuvers upon each other’s hair, or-” She stopped abruptly when she realized that shadowy flames had engulfed Raven’s entire form. Typically, when a ruby guard started setting things on fire, it was best to ready one’s defenses or evacuate the premises.

“… You wish to be alone?”

“ _How_ could you tell?” Raven grumbled.

Star Sapphire reluctantly headed for the elevator, and the Ops room resumed its former peace… for perhaps two seconds.

“Azarath Metrion Zin-”

“MAIL CALL!”  Cyborg hollered.

Raven shrieked and fell out of the air. Star Sapphire, meanwhile, seemed overjoyed at the boy’s arrival, and flew over to greet them.

“Robin, Beast Boy, Cyborg, you have returned! It was… quiet while you were gone,” Star said.

Raven successfully refrained from scowling, but she couldn’t stop the sarcastic comment from slipping out: “Not _that_ quiet.”

“Check it out!” said Beast Boy, dropping a large crate. “This was sitting by the front door. Fan mail! Probably a gift from one of my many admirers.” He wiggled his eyebrows, presumably in imitation of a fan’s blades, Star decided.

“Actually, it doesn’t say who it’s from,” Robin said.

“Well, one way to find out!” Cyborg said, already prying off the lid.

Star Sapphire was apprehensive of what they would find, but upon opening the package, all three Earthlings became immediately excited. Each of them exclaimed and crowded closer to the box. Star Sapphire hovered over them to see. She made out several tiny, colorful figures; it was a new type of Earthling! But – they weren’t moving.

“Please, they are… deactivated?” she asked.

“Nah, these don’t activate,” Cyborg said. “They’re puppets. Y’know, toys.”

Cyborg held up the puppet, a tiny replica of himself, and then maneuvered it into a series of fighting stances. “Like this, see – Hey!” Robin’s puppet had sent Cyborg’s puppet swinging with a flying kick.  Explanation forgotten, Cyborg goaded, “You want a piece of this little man?” and attacked Robin’s puppet back. Beast Boy joined the scuffle a moment later.

 Star Sapphire blinked and looked down at her star-puppet. “What thoughtful gifts. They must serve as excellent visualizations when strategizing for battle.” She considered the three teammates who were currently engaged in marionette combat and the one teammate who was not.

“Shall my tiny replica do battle with your tiny replica?” she asked Raven, holding up her puppet.

Raven tossed the puppet to Star Sapphire on her way to the exit.

“Knock yourself out.”

)o(

Raven was annoyed when Star Sapphire first showed up outside her door that evening, claiming to have heard strange noises, but in the end, that three seconds heads-up was the only reason they survived the night.

It wasn’t enough warning to overcome the shock of being attacked by their own friends, though.

Star Sapphire pulled her out of the way of a sonic blast that missed them by inches, and then Robin was aiming a kick at the little alien’s head and Raven was suddenly hit with a face-full of dinosaur breath.

“Beast Boy, it’s me!”

Beast Boy didn’t care and kept trying to chomp his way through her shields.

“Don’t make me hurt you – OOF!” One surprise velociraptor tail to the abdomen sent her flying back, straight into Cyborg’s waiting arms, where Star Sapphire was already being held. Her toes strained to find the ground but found nothing. They were both well and truly suspended.

Raven didn’t know what the in the nine flaming regions of the underworld was going on, but she was really starting to hate this tall people vs small people arrangement.

A hollow, wooden laughter echoed through the corridor.

Raven stared in disgust – and then horror – as a living puppet lurching forth from the shadows. He was at least a foot shorter than Star Sapphire and made of wood and silk. He wore old-fashioned military regalia, and he’d probably been quite fancy at one point, but now he was creaky and fraying. _And he was holding three very familiar smaller puppets in his hand._

“Star…phire,” said puppet-Robin.

“Ra-ven,” said puppet-Cyborg.

“Help,” said puppet-Beast Boy.

“Release them!” Raven demanded, but from where she was, arms pinned by Cyborg’s iron grip, she was at a serious disadvantage. Of the five of them, only Star Sapphire still had free will and the ability to throw off her restraints, but she hung limp in Cyborg’s other arm with her mouth agape. Raven thought now might be a good time for some alien super strength, but it did not appear to be forthcoming.

“Sorry, but you’re not in charge here. You don’t command me. The Puppet King commands you,” declared the self-stylized Puppet King. “And with the Puppet King pulling the strings, the Teen Titans will command the entire city.”

In his hand, a marionette’s handle lit up in a display of indigo and tangerine-colored lights that dazzled the eye and befuddled the mind, light and airy and beckoning, drawing them in with each pulse. Raven felt herself drifting away. No… she had to resist…

“Azarath… Metrion… _Zinthos.”_

\----------------------------------------

Something was wrong. The Puppet King’s spell had failed; they were not puppets, and they were getting away, but something was still wrong. It wasn’t until she and Star had hidden in a shadowy maintenance tunnel under the Tower that Raven was able to stop and process her situation.

She felt… dull. Disconnected. Had that spell severed some sort of important body-soul connection? Three sets of feet stomped past overhead, and Raven withdrew deeper into the shadows. She hated feeling like she was being hunted-

_A rabbit and a fox trapped in an enclosure. Each clothed, each looking up, and each panicking._

A whimper came out of the darkness. Star Sapphire. Raven shook off the strange thought and focused on their situation.

“Star? Are you alright?” There was a lightbulb around here somewhere… spotting it, Raven pulled the cord-

And illuminated her own face staring down at her.

Star Sapphire sucked in a terrible rattling breath, like she didn’t quite know how to use human lungs. “You are me!” she cried, “and I am you!”

A streak of wild black lightning struck out their only light. In the darkness, Star Sapphire could hear an unfamiliar pounding, fast and loud in her ears, and a swirling grayness at the edge of her vision. She recognized the first thing as a heartbeat, but the second she could only guess at.

“How is this possible?” Star asked.

“The Puppet King’s remote,” Raven realized. “When I knocked it away from him, it must have interrupted his spell. Our souls must have returned to the wrong bodies.”

“Then we must find that remote and switch ourselves and our friends back.”

Star Sapphire could just barely make out Raven’s silhouette as she nodded. “Let’s get moving.”

 

)o(

 

Two miserable hours later, and they had yet to make much progress on the whole stopping-the-villain-and-saving-their-friends thing

“How can you stand this poufy skirt?”

“Quickly Raven! Our friends are in danger, we must follow and-”

“And what? Save them with my unusable powers while your unbridled emotions blow us to bits? Nice flying, by the way.”

That wasn’t fair of her, Raven knew, but her nerves were fried. It wasn’t bad enough that they’d switched bodies, or that their teammates were being held hostage. Noooo, the empty, super-powered shells of their friends had to chase them across the city, they _had_ to crash land in a _dumpster_ , and the teammate she’d switched bodies with had to be _the most_ emotional person she knew. And to add irony to injustice, this entire night she’d had to look at the world through rose-tinted bangs. Their situation might have been salvageable if they still had their own powers, but as it was…

“At least I am able to fly! You _have_ the knowledge of flight, it is programmed into my gem, but you are too busy being grumpy to heed it!”

Raven seethed. “You may have my body, but you know nothing about me.”

Star Sapphire wanted to scream. She knew terabytes about Raven! She knew that she was irritable like a quartz, but pearl-like in her long silences and ability to sit for hours doing apparently nothing. She knew that she liked books and was an organic being of the female variety. She knew all about her fighting style and her powers from training – or at least she had thought she did, until she had to wield those powers.

She hadn’t known until a couple hours ago that Raven’s abilities were also controlled by emotions, just like hers. She hadn’t known until a week ago that the hooded one wasn’t even from Earth.

“Perhaps, you are right,” Star said slowly. “And if you and I are to overcome this ordeal, we must know everything about each other… so, begin sharing.”

Raven became very still. Star Sapphire watched from behind as her own shoulders slowly tensed up. For once, Raven didn’t seem to have a ready reply, so Star Sapphire asked the question that bothered her most.

“When we first met, why did you get so upset when I called you-?”

“Please, don’t finish that question.”

 _Gem._ The word hovered, unspoken, between them.  “Ask me anything, but not that.” There was real pain in Raven’s voice now, so Star stopped. For a long moment, the only sound in the alleyway was the distant noise of traffic. A breeze swept by, and Star Sapphire shivered as she experienced cold for the first time.

Raven wearily rubbed her face and received a new shock – only one eye. Star Sapphire only had one eye. They really didn’t know each other at all.

Raven sighed.

 “I was born in a place called Azarath,” she began. “In the temple, at the heart of the city. There, I was raised by the monks and taught control.”

“What about your parents?” _Damn it_ , Raven thought. From the back of her head, Wisdom noted how amazing it was that Star Sapphire had been socialized into human social norms so quickly.

“My father was…  a very bad person, and he was incarcerated for his crimes.” _Understatement_. “My mother fled this dimension to get away from him and was offered sanctuary in Azarath. She has never been cruel, but… she doesn’t want me. I think I remind her of her own mistakes. We avoid each other.”

“I had Azar though,” she said hurriedly, before Star could ask another question or make a pitying remark. “She was… my teacher, but also my friend.

“It was Azar who realized my powers were linked to emotions and who began my training in the way of the monks of Azarath. The other monks believed I should be kept in isolation, lest I destroy everything, but Azar thought differently, and when I had gained sufficient control she introduced me first to books and then to the city beyond the Temple.”

Star Sapphire gave a soft smile. “She sounds like my _kanorfka_ ; I should like to meet her someday.”

“That isn’t…” Raven took a shaky breath, and a wave of blue overwhelmed Star Sapphire’s vision before Raven composed herself once more, and the color vanished. “That’s not possible. My father sent his minions to try and kidnap me when I was 13, and she died protecting me. It became clear to me then that my father would stop at nothing to get me, since he believes I am the key to escaping his prison.

"I- I think there may be a way to fight him, a way to keep him from ever coming back, but Azarath is pacifistic, and the monks believe our destinies are inevitable. So I left.”

Star Sapphire’s eyes were burning, and not with star bolts. “That – that is not a happy story.” Raven shrugged in acquiescence, but her expression remained neutral. Star frowned and looked down at the pavement. “I am afraid I cannot offer a more pleasant tale.

“I was harvested from Kindergarten Facet 12L9A, at which time I was assigned to an emerald lieutenant, to be her advisor.” Star paused, wondering how to explain her defect.

Raven waited expectantly, but Star only bit her lip nervously.

“Just like that?” Raven finally asked. “You were going to become a military advisor right after you were… ‘harvested’?”

Star Sapphire flinched. “Sapphires are _supposed_ to become advisors to important gems. Most sapphires have future vision with which to guide their leaders: I do not. My defect was quickly realized after I was deployed. I should have been recycled then – what use is a Sapphire without future vision? - but sapphires are in scarce supply, so instead I was sent to the labs. 

“The labs are where the research-class gems run their experiments. Mostly, we were assistants. But sometimes, we were subjects.” Star Sapphire lifted one pale finger to trace the gleaming orange gem on Raven’s chest.

Raven’s breath hitched, but Star Sapphire was caught up in the memories elicited by the pale, unnatural star stretching across her gem, and didn’t notice.

“The labs are where I got my star bolts,” she continued. “Where I learned to fight and build. It was a terrible, violent place, but I was lucky. A _kanorfka_ , a gem who looks after other gems, took notice of me and protected me, from the other inmates at least. You would call her a ‘friend,’ or maybe a guardian.

“I still had visions though. They are not of the future. I do not believe they are even real, but they showed me life beyond the lab. They made me hope. I decided I had to escape Homeworld and its colonies. But just when I had finally managed to do so, I was captured by the Gordanians. After that… as the Earth saying goes, you know the rest of the story.”

“Yeah…” Raven said lamely. She couldn’t physically sense the emotions around her anymore, but they hung overhead anyway, making things heavy and awkward. Star Sapphire’s story was too traumatic for her to not feel that she ought to do something to help, but she had no idea what. Saving the rest of her team, she decided, was easier and currently more pressing. “So,” she said. “How do star bolts work?”

__

Forty minutes later found them crouching behind a fountain outside an ornate but dilapidated theater. A green and four-legged earth-creature guarding the steps marked the location as the Puppet King’s current headquarters.

“Safe to say we’re not walking in through the front door,” Raven said. “We’ll have to try the roof.”

“Agreed,” Star Sapphire whispered. “Now, do just as I instructed. Close your eyes and think of something joyful.”

Raven sighed. Joy. Joy-joy-joy-joy-joy. What made Raven joyous?

_Two people in the tundra, about to embark on a dangerous mission, holding hands and leaning closer…_

Raven ignored the stray vision of some alternate dimension – for she was sure, now, that that was what they were. Then a startling thought popped into her head. Immediately, Raven shot it back down, but she was supposed to be channeling her emotions, not suppressing them, right? Cautiously, she re-examined the idea. It was an absolutely absurd notion, completely ridiculous, and it would be unwise to consider such a thing as herself, but so long as she wasn’t herself, so long as she didn’t actually do anything…

She looked at Star, who was leaning in close, waxing poetic about the laughter of children and whiskers on kittens and whatnot.

She imagined them back in their own bodies, Star still leaning close but slowly trailing off. She imagined the soft press of lips, the warm aura that enveloped Star Sapphire expanding to encompass both of them, the light brush of Star’s hair against her cheek.

Raven’s feet lifted off the ground.

A moment later they were on top of the building.

“Oh, very, very good!” the real Star Sapphire enthused. “Tell me, what was your joyous thought?”

Gems could blush, right? Because Raven was pretty sure her face was flaming orange at that moment. “… you don’t wanna know.”

“Oh, but I do! What did you imagine?”

Raven cast about for something, anything to say but the whole truth- “You… not talking?”

She cringed – though, she supposed it wasn’t a complete lie – but Star Sapphire only furrowed her eyebrows.

Star Sapphire had known before their feet left the ground that Raven had succeeded in finding a joyous thought. Her whole general vicinity had radiated a pink that was felt and not seen. Now, however, she had gone a peculiar orange-gray. Raven had explained how her empathy worked, but she hadn’t explained what all the individual colors meant. “Oh, well…” Star said. “I am glad I was able to help?”

Raven sighed. She could worry about this later. “Your turn,” she said, pointing at a pair of trapdoors set into the roof; they were chained shut with a thick padlock. “Focus your energy on the lock.”

Star Sapphire stared at the primitive metal lock, focusing on the lock, on her desire for it to break, on Raven’s powers slicing through the metal…

The padlock cleaved neatly in half and fell off.

“Nice work!”

Star Sapphire stretched Raven’s gray face into the biggest and brightest smile it’d ever made at the compliment, and at once the roof doors began to rattle dangerously.

“Star!”

The rattling ceased.

“Sorry,” Star whispered sheepishly. She opened the doors quietly this time, and they crept into the darkened building.

)o(

They found their friends just in time. The Puppet King was onstage, surrounded by candles and chalked rune symbols. Three wooden boys dangled from his outstretched arm over a ritual fire.

The righteous fury immediately bubbled up in Star Sapphire, but it was unaccompanied by the familiar fire. _Focus,_ she thought _._ Star Sapphire summoned the magic, enveloping her three friends in dark energy, and floated them up off the stage and into the safety of the rafters. Then she hugged them.

“My friends!” She squealed. “You are unharmed!”

Puppet-Robin’s voice was muffled and very confused. “Star?”

“It’s a long story,” Raven said.

_Three kids and a lemur being ambushed by warriors with golden fans._

“Look out!”

A sonic blast from zombie-Cyborg sent them flying in three separate directions.

Raven pushed herself off the floor of the orchestra pit. A shadow fell over her. She jumped out of the way a fraction of a second before a ginormous fist came down where she had been. Raven looked up, straight into the glowing blue eyes of zombie-Beast Boy. He was already pulling his fist back again.

Raven dodged, leaping back into the audience section and springing from seatback to seatback. Zombie-Beast Boy pursued, forcing her farther and farther from her friends. Even with Star Sapphire’s super-speed (the easiest of her powers for Raven to master, as it was fueled by unflinching determination) it was all Raven could do to stay out of zombie-Beast Boy’s path. She growled and changed tactics. When her mind-controlled teammate brought both fists together and prepared to crush her, she dug in her heels, stuck out her hands, and hoped for the best…

Whoa.

Even zombie-Beast Boy looked surprised, if that was possible. The towering gorilla stopped and stared at the three-foot-tall ginger alien in a poufy dress that had just stood up to the force of his blow. Raven smirked.

She’d just halted a full-grown gorilla, and that was with very little faith. Imagine what she could do if she felt some of that ‘boundless confidence’ Star Sapphire had said was needed to access her full alien strength.

Raven shifted her grip and flung her teammate into the air. For a happy second, she thought she’d gained the upper hand, but of course, zombie-Beast Boy just transformed into a falcon and started dive bombing her. Raven coaxed herself into the air and started working on summoning the righteous fury needed to unleash star bolts.

On the other side of the theater, Star Sapphire was having greater success with Raven’s powers. A lifetime under the militaristic regime of the Diamond Authority had taught her to focus, even in times of distress, and focus was the key to using Raven’s powers. Unlike her own abilities, each of which was based on a specific emotion, it didn’t matter what she felt so long as she could use that feeling to justify what she wanted to do. Right now, Star Sapphire was furious, and it was easy to channel that fury into throwing sandbags at not-Cyborg and looping ropes around not-Robin, who were both preventing her from getting to the Puppet King. The hard part about Raven’s powers, Star Sapphire remembered when the catwalk bucked beneath her feet, was that if she let her emotions get too strong, or got distracted, the dark energy would lash out, and it was just as likely to crush her friends as it was to strike her enemies. Star Sapphire levitated another sandbag into the air and flung it at not-Robin.

He dodged it easily, and the projectile went sailing well into the audience, nearly hitting Raven. She was still engaged in aerial combat and still unable to sustain even a tiny star bolt long enough to fire it. Without warning, Zombie-Beast Boy shifted from a falcon to an elephant directly overhead. Raven yelped.

For a moment, Raven felt like she’d been buried alive. Then she kicked out with both feet, and the elephant flipped trunk over heels, slammed into a wall, and slumped to the ground.

Raven stood up and dusted herself off, glad to finally catch her breath.

_A massive, moon-like spaceship blowing up an entire planet with a single deadly ray of emerald light._

Raven shivered. On instinct, she looked back at the stage. She saw a toddler-sized figure run up to the fire once more. It raised its arms, prepared to throw something into the flames.

**“NO!”**

The star bolt shot out of her hand and bowled the puppet king over, away from the fire. Raven dashed towards the stage. She was moving even faster than before now. There was fire inside her, the gem in her chest pulsing with solar energy, like a heartbeat on steroids.

The puppet king’s controller was still in the air, thrown by the force of her star bolt. She raced towards it. Zombie-Cyborg tried to block her. She slid between his legs and kept running. The controller hit a stage light and ricocheted. She leaped for it – and missed. It fell into the fire as she fell back to earth.

Then suddenly, Raven was airborne again. A harsh, cold wind tore through her very being. Then her soul snapped back into her proper body, and a profound sense of relief overcame her. Raven took a deep breath, and savored the simple joy of air rushing down her throat and into her lungs.

 “I am me!” Star Sapphire exclaimed. “And you are you!”

“And we’re us!” whooped Cyborg, vaulting onto the stage.

“Thanks to you two!” Robin grinned, coming out of the wings.

Behind him, Beast Boy chimed in, “You go girls!”

Star Sapphire was floating. “Raven! We have done it!” She cried, and squished Raven to her chest.

Raven blinked. She might’ve blushed too, just a little bit, and it crossed her mind that she _really_ needed to meditate.

“You’re hugging me,” was all she managed to say.

_“Noooo!”_

As a team, they spun to face the Puppet King. He had always looked creepy, but now he looked pitiful, dragging himself along the ground with a smoldering hole in his chest.

“The magic… without it, I’m just a-”

He spoke no more.

Raven stared at the crater her star bolt had caused. It only took 20 minutes for the police to arrive to collect the remains and document the evidence, and then the Titans went home, but the image of the charred wooden body would haunt her for a long time afterwards.

)o(

_Azarath. Metrion. Zinthos._

_Azarath. Metrion. Zinthos._

“Raven?”

The girl in question cracked open an eyelid.

“I am sorry to interrupt you,” Star Sapphire said, “but-”

“I haven’t seen Robin, Beast Boy, or Cyborg.”

Star Sapphire fiddled with her skirt, but she understood Raven better now. If Raven was being short with her, it was only because she needed to put herself back in order after the night’s events. “Truthfully, I am wishing to join you in meditation,” she said.

“Really?” Raven asked. She didn’t need an answer, though; she could sense Star’s sincerity. “Alright.”

Star Sapphire crossed her legs and sat next to her.

“Focus on your breath,” Raven instructed. “Acknowledge your thoughts, but don’t let them distract you; clear your mind.”

The two hovered companionably, chanting Raven’s mantra. Occasionally, Raven offered a bit of advice, and Star did her best to follow it. She proved to be a far more patient student than Raven would have thought a day ago. But then, Raven hadn’t really known Star Sapphire a day ago.

Eventually, Raven asked. “Star Sapphire?”

“Yes?”

“After this, would you like to go to the mall?”

Star Sapphire smiled. “Of course.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is one of my favorite episodes, so I hope I did it justice! ^_^
> 
> I'm writing, coincidentally, from a country that is not my homeland and where I am considered very short. All of the appliances are confusing and the social customs are even more so. I couldn't have foreseen that I would study abroad and experience all this firsthand when I started writing Star Cross three or four years ago lol, but now I'm here, and oh my stars! Y'all! The culture shock is hitting me hard right now. Expect even more of it than usual in the chapters to come. XD


	9. Mountain Friends

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A shepherd offers guidance to a trio of otherworldly beings, Steven heralds the Giant Woman, and all of my friends are weirdly into goats.

Jericho was having an exciting day.

He was at goat camp – that part was normal – but above the bleating and baaing of his herd he could hear voices coming up the mountain! Lots of voices, singing and bickering and laughing and accompanied by ukulele.

Jericho sent Fluff-Fluff down to greet them, and then he waited. (At least, he hoped it was Fluff-Fluff. Butt-Head was at least as fluffy, but he didn’t take kindly to visitors.)

He sat on the sitting rock, pulled out his guitar, and began strumming the traditional waiting song: _She’ll be Coming Down the Mountain When She Comes._

He didn’t have to wait long; all of his goats were excellent climbers. Soon, Jericho could make out the words one of the travelers was singing.

“-allll I wanna do, is see you turn into, a giant woman” sang a boy as they rounded a boulder and finally came into view.

“Baaaaaa!” Sang Fluff-Fluff.

Jericho clapped.

The travelers gasped. One of them pointed a previously non-existent spear at him, while another pulled a whip out of her chest.

Jericho kept his hands on the guitar, calmly plucking the song for arrival, _Here Comes the Bride_ , with hands in plain view to show he was harmless and unarmed.

(Not that he was truly either of those things; his eyes were wide open after all. But they didn’t need to know that.)

“Whoa, do you live up here?” Asked the curly haired boy riding Fluff-Fluff (and it was definitely Fluff-Fluff; Butt-Head headbutted anyone who got too close.)

Jericho nodded.

“Cool!” The boy exclaimed, his curls bouncing in his excitement. He had very thick hair. Jericho caught himself wondering if the boy needed to be shorn soon. And then he wondered if he’d been spending too much time with sheep and goats.

Probably.

“Is this your mountain goat? I can get off.”

Jericho waved his hands dismissively and smiled.

The two women both relaxed. Or at least, they lowered their weapons. The tall one didn’t look like the kind of person who relaxed much.

Jericho had noticed, of course, that the women were oddly colored and had giant stones embedded in their skin, but he’d seen plenty of strange people in his lifetime, so he knew not to stare. His dad used to meet with all kinds of strange folks, and only a few of them were the kind who’d slit your throat if it suited them. His dad probably still met with lots of strange people, but Jericho and his dad weren’t on speaking terms anymore.

Most recently, the only people Jericho had seen, metahuman or otherwise, were the potato farmers who lived on the other side of the mountain, near sheep camp, and Garnet. Garnet often came to the mountain to stargaze. She never said much, and Jericho, of course, never said anything at all, but he appreciated the company.

Jericho wondered if the other travelers knew her.

“Do you know where the heaven beetle’s temple is?” Asked the tall one with the pearl in her forehead, who was probably called Pearl.

“It’s like, really small, and probably at the top of a cliff or something,” added the small one with the purple gem in her chest, who was probably called Amethyst or Purple Diamond or some such.

Jericho nodded. He pointed north to the next mountain peak, and then gestured to a break in the junipers where a footpath began.

“Thank you, Mr. Shepherd!” said the boy with the star on his shirt who was probably called…. Star Boy?

Star Boy waved as they left, and Jericho waved back before he returned to his guitar playing.

A goat settled at his feet. It took several songs for Jericho to notice how fluffy and cuddly the goat was. But then he immediately stopped playing and stared at the goat in shock.

Jericho examined the goat next to him intently, and then looked at each goat in the clearing, but there was no mistaking it. This was Fluff-Fluff. Which meant Star-Boy was riding Butt-Head without being impaled.

Huh. He’d definitely have to ask Garnet about them, the next time he saw her.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, technically Garnet was telling the truth in chapter 6 - she does have secret super hero friends! :3


	10. A Game of Risk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Let the tournament begin.

“Welcome, all!” boomed a deep voice.

Raven and Star Sapphire jolted into defensive positions before they had even taken in their unexpected new surroundings.

Just minutes ago, they’d been playing cards in the ops room. Then the boys had vanished without a trace. And now, it seemed, _they_ had been yanked into…. wherever they were. Rising up on all sides was a sleek metallic dome that reminded Star Sapphire uncomfortably of Homeworld. Stars glittered in all of the windows, far away galaxies rendered bright and numerous by the lack of atmosphere. At the center of the room was a raised dais, on which stood a broad-shouldered, human-like being who was covered in grey fur and wearing many gold cuffs.

The beginnings of a star bolt flickered to life inside her closed fist. Was this where their friends had been taken? Robin, Cyborg, and Beast Boy were nowhere in sight, though the girls were by no means alone; around them were several other women (Star Sapphire thought they were women, anyway,) in costumes so outlandish they could only be super heroes… or super villains. On Star Sapphire’s left, a young human in a red suit with black polka dots warily unclasped her yoyo and started spinning it close to her side, like she was still deciding who she should hit. On Raven’s right, a woman swathed in a black burqa was slower to reach for her weapon, though her stance just as on guard.

“I am the Master of Games,” said the grey furry man, “and you are hereby invited to compete in the tournament of heroines!”

“Raven, I have a bad feeling about this,” Star Sapphire whispered. On the pedestal, the strange being continued to proclaim the greatness of his “friendly tournament” and the “grand prizes” there would be at the end. Her unease only heightened when she noticed the large gem hanging like an amulet from his neck.

“Agreed,” Raven said.

Far in the back, two students of the decidedly villainous HIVE academy were paying closer attention to the Master of Games’ speech, and both of them were frowning. “Heroines?” Jinx repeated. “Why were _we_ dragged into this then?”

Beside her, Bumblebee couldn’t help but mutter, “Probably ‘cuz even super powered women are under-represented.”

Jinx flashed a wry grin before someone near the front gave a much louder protest.

Garnet’s future vision had just confirmed what common sense already told her; this creature could not be trusted. “He’s lying!” she declared.

Her voice carried in the metal chamber, and everyone heard her. The Master of Games looked down at her and scowled. Garnet ignored him.

“He means to trap you in his amulet and take your abilities,” she continued, turning to address the crowd of young heroines behind her. The tournament was of no interest to her, but she knew the allure of glory and prizes would tempt some of the others.  Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Pearl and Amethyst pull out their weapons and move to stand between her back and the self-stylized Master of Games.

“Why should we believe _you_?” Came a voice from the rear of the crowd.

Raven tapped Star Sapphire’s shoulder and pointed out the speaker. Star Sapphire had to levitate to see above the crowd, but when she saw them, she instantly recognized the pink hair-horns.

“How could you know if he’s lying?” Jinx demanded. She had just been warming up to the idea of kicking superheroine butt one-on-one for once. Especially if there was money involved.

“I have future vision,” Garnet said simply.

Star Sapphire gasped and ducked back down. The voice was all wrong, but… who except a sapphire could have future vision?

“What’s-?” Raven began, before a _book_ flew over her shoulder. It careened overhead, passed the Master of Games’ outstretched fist, and smacked him in the face.

The Master of Games swore, and all chaos broke loose.

The heroines closest to him all seemed to attack at once, and Star Sapphire saw energy blasts, flying rocks, and what she thought might be an Amethyst spin dash. In the face of this barrage, the Master of Games could only fight to keep balance, swatting at attacks the way humans swat at bees–only to be punched by a bee-themed superheroine. A spotted red yoyo completely encircled him and pinned his arms to the side before a woman even taller and more muscular then he tackled him to the ground.

It was the most “extra” takedown of a villain Star Sapphire had ever seen. Raven hadn’t even bothered moving closer, and Star slunk behind her. It wasn’t the Master of Games she was worried about here.

He lay on the floor, shock evident in his feature “I… lost,” he said. And then he poofed into his own amulet.

The superheroines gathered around the gaudy trinket.

“Uhh… now what?” Amethyst said, stowing her whip.

The woman in black pulled out a ruler and started prodding the necklace experimentally.

“There doesn’t appear to be any writing on it.” She noted. “No levers or buttons on the inlay, either.”

The strongwomen – who, Star Sapphire now realized, was wearing a cute cat mask – cracked her knuckles.

“I say we smash it.”

Jinx immediately shook her head, shouting “Wait-!”

But she was too late, Cat-Mask woman had already punched the amulet, and a blinding light burst out of it. Garnet just barely had the time and foresight to reach out and bubble the gem before the same energy that had brought them there warped them back.

~)o(~

When Garnet reformed, she was back in Steven’s room, where they’d been before the whole “Tournament of Heroines” nonsense had begun. And there, sitting on the couch, was-

“Steven!” Pearl practically tackled him, scooping him up into a hug. “Are you alright? Are you hurt?”

Steven wiggled in her grasp, trying to see. “I’m fine! You guys will never believe what happened,” he exclaimed. “I got to meet real life superheroes!”

“Yooo, what are we, chopped liver?” Amethyst said, flopping onto the coffee table.

“Amethyst, you love chopped liver,” Garnet pointed out.

“Fair.”

Steven went on. “There was this big furry guy called the Master of Games, and he wanted us to fight in a tournament, but I didn’t really wanna do that, so I asked to go home, only he didn’t let me and instead he trapped me in this weird gem artifact - wait, it was **that** gem artifact!” He cried pointing at the amulet – still whole and safely bubbled – floating above Garnet’s palm.

Steven _gasped_. “Did the Master of Games kidnap you too?!”

“Yep,” Garnet said, banishing the bubble to the depths of the temple.

“Wow… who won?”

“In the Tournament of Heroines?” Pearl asked, finally releasing Steven and standing up. “Nobody. We collectively chose not to participate.”

“Yeah, we just skipped to beating up the Furry,” Amethyst said, cracking her knuckles.

“Heh, guess you guys caught on faster than we did.”

“Yeah, Garnet was totally like, ‘It’s a trap!’ and then this ninja lady threw a book right in the dude’s face, and then this totally epic panther wrestler was like BAM! And I did this spin dash, and this ladybug chick went- "

“I think I saw another gem,” Pearl broke in.

Amethyst blinked. “Wait… what?”

“Whaaaaaaaaat? There are other gems?!?” Steven cried

Amethyst shrugged uneasily. “Yeah, there’s like a whole planet of them.”

“More than one,” Garnet muttered darkly.

“That’s so cool!” Steven said, slapping his hands to his cheeks.

The three older gems exchanged grim looks.

“What do we do Garnet?”

Garnet was silent.

“It doesn’t make sense,” she said finally

“Who cares? We should just find her and bubble her before homegirl screws everything up.”

Steven’s forehead wrinkled “I don’t understand,” he said. “Was she a gem monster?”

“No, she looked like a regular sapphire… About this tall, with puff sleeves and full skirts,” Pearl tacked on helpfully for Steven, who had never seen a Sapphire before.

“Then why do we have to bubble her? She was at the tournament of heroines. She must be a hero too!” Steven insisted.

“That’s impossible,” Pearl scoffed.

“Not impossible,” Garnet said. “Just _highly_ improbable.”

“So whatta we do?”

Garnet adjusted her glasses. “We’ll just have to keep an eye out for her.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Jazz hands* They're meeting! Slooooowlly.
> 
> (Romances aren't the only slowburn relationships in this house.)
> 
> The other super-heroines featured or cameo'd in this chapter were: Bumblebee, Pantha, Jinx, Argent, and Terra (TT) Ladybug (Miraculous Ladybug) and Burqa Avenger (Burqa Avenger). Because it's already a massive crossover fic, so why not? XD
> 
> Let me know what you think!!!! :D

**Author's Note:**

> I have this bad feeling that anything I type in this box will appear on every chapter, but... Tada! :D
> 
> I'm taking a bit of a different approach to crossover in this fic, so please leave a review and let me know what you think! ^_^ Some chapters, like this one, will mirror episodes pretty closely, while others are plucked completely out of the æther. Hopefully I will maybe be able to do that thing, the thing where this is updated weekly??? but hgnnhhhh, idk, we'll find out next Saturday.
> 
> p.s. I promise the Crystal Gems, Homeworld, and Beach City will also be a part of this fanfic ;)


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